Sword Art Online I: The Demon
by KrystorAkuhei
Summary: "Tell me. What is it that you love about Aincrad the most? Surely you have something to say, oh wondrous fallen angel Lucifer." Plunge into the world of Aincrad with Koujou Akira as he trudges through the death trap known as SAO and conquers it with finality, and personally experience the true living sensation of being trapped in the death game. LINK START!
1. The Beginning

**Hey readers! This is my first fanfic so I hope that you can all review, comment and favorite this so I can become better at this! I'll be including canon and non-canon stuff in this story, and hopefully if I have enough determination continue this story all the way through to the Excalibur Arc!**

 **Also, another thing; I'm a terribly shabby writer, so I don't know how well this will go, but I'll do my best to listen to suggestions and incorporate advise into my writing!**

 **Disclaimer: I do not own Sword Art Online.**

 **Now, without further ado, I present to you, ladies and gentlemen, Sword Art Online I: The Demon**

Chapter 1

Location: In the suburbs of Tokyo

Date: November 6, 2022

Data saved.

 _All right! Today's the first day of the fervently awaited VRMMO, Sword Art Online! Thousands of people all around Japan have lined the streets trying their luck at obtaining the first release of this game! Only 10,000 copies of this game were released…_

I turned off the TV and turned my attention to the shiny game cover of Sword Art Online. Since I was one of the extremely lucky 1000 beta testers that had the opportunity of playing the beta version of the game, I had priority access to the retail version once it hit the market. Luckily for me, the minute the game hit the online stores, my personal copy was shipped in to my mailbox so I didn't have to wait in long lines or anything like that.

Anyways, a little about me. My name is Koujou Akira, I'm currently 13 years old and 5' 5". I have dark violet eyes and pitch black hair, which explains why my two favorite colors are violet and black. I have a bishounen face, which annoys me greatly. I-

"ONII-CHAN! I'm going to practice now! See you later!"

Yes, now that she's marked her exit, I can properly explain. I have a little sister who's about 2 years younger than me, and she has the same features that I do. She's 4'11" and loves to do kendo, which I also do. My personality is easy to get along with but I have a slight affinity for being picky about my friends, so I only have 1—my sister. Everyone else seems to either drift away from me or I push them away, so… yeah.

Anyways, back to the game. Sword Art Online was the world's first VRMMO, or Virtual Reality Massively Multiplayer Online game, and the first shipment of 10,000 copies sold out just hours after it was released, both online and in shops.

I quickly checked the time and realized that launch would be in 5 minutes. I quickly inserted the game, connected all of the wires and hardware together, and put the Nerv Gear on my head. When the headgear charged up, I smiled and said the initiative words.

 _"Link Start!"_

Instantly bright rainbow colors appeared in my vision, and as soon as I passed through it a character screen popped up in front of me.

USE BETA DATA FOR KRYSTOR(M) ?

YES/NO

I selected yes, and I passed through a ring of electrical-blue color and appeared in the beginning city of Aincrad, The Town of Beginnings. I smiled slightly at the colorful sight in front of me as teleportation lights flashed all around me signifying other players' arrivals.

I clenched my fist and said quietly, "I'm back in this world."

Once I arrived in the game, I ran directly towards the best weapons dealer NPC shop that I knew in The Town of Beginnings. When I entered the shop, a chiming sound went off, indicating the entrance of a player. An elderly NPC man was sitting behind a counter displaying several choice weapons. He noticed me when I entered and smiled.

"Hello, welcome to my shop. Can I do anything for you?"

I noticed that the NPC was waiting for my response, so I spoke up. "Yes, could I see your store items please?" After I said this a menu of the shop's items popped up in front of me. It had various tabs indicating the different types of items. I pressed on the 'Weapons' tab and then 'One-handed Weapons'. As I scrolled through the list of weapons ranging from maces to spears to swords, I took note of a sword that seemed longer and sleeker than the rest. Its name was 'One-handed Longsword'.

Recognizing the beginners longsword that I had once in the beta, I smiled to myself and selected it for purchase. As soon as I made the purchase the sword appeared in my inventory, and my col balance depleted some. After I obtained a suitable weapon I went to the miscellaneous tab and bought a black leather jacket, a pair of black fingerless gloves and a pair of black boots.

Realizing that I only had about 10 col left in my balance I quickly thanked the NPC shopkeeper and ran out of the shop. I quickly opened up my play menu by swiping downwards with my right hand and navigated to my player status window.

Krystor: Level 1 HP: 500 Strength 5 Agility 5 Skills: N/A

Col: 10

I equipped my new change of battle gear and clothes and headed out towards the 'Great Plains' at the east gate of The Town of Beginnings. While I ran through the city I opened up my player menu again, this time opening the 'Skills' window. I saw that I had one available skill slot. I pressed on it and selected One-handed Sword. With my sword sheathed on my back I ran full speed towards the 'Great Plains'.

When I reached the field I saw my first monster. It was a Lv. 1 mob called a Frenzy Boar. An orange cursor hung above its head as it grazed the grass around it. In this game, all mobs were enemies, and defeating them gave a player col, xp and possibly item drops. Passive mobs initially had an orange cursor above their heads, and wouldn't attack unless provoked. Attacking a passive mob would turn it aggressive and turn the orange cursor red. Aggressive mobs attack players on sight and would have red cursors hanging above their heads.

I initiated a 'first attack' by throwing a little stone at it. The second the stone hit the boar, its cursor turned red and its level and HP bar appeared next to its faced me, pawing at the ground. I quickly drew my longsword and waited for its attack. When the mob attacked by charging headfirst at me, I simply sidestepped the boar's charge and raised my longsword above my head, activating the sword skill Vertical. Glowing bright hue of yellow, my sword slashed down onto the boar and its HP quickly decreased to 0. With a squeal of pain, the boar exploded in a shower of shining polygonal particles of light. That was death in this world- quick and instantaneous without leaving a single trace of life behind.

I quickly dismissed the rewards screen that appeared after I had defeated the monster and ran directly towards a section of the first floor where I knew I could level up quickly and safely. Although I knew that even if I died I would just respawn at the Black Iron Palace in the starting city, the first floor was huge, and I didn't want to waste any precious time transversing the floor again just because I made a simple mistake and accidentally died.

While I ran I activated sword skill after sword skill, slashing through mobs quickly and efficiently. By the time I reached my intended destination, the Linden Forest, my level was already up to 3. When I entered the forest, I immediately sensed the level difference between the mobs here and the ones outside. The first mob I encountered was the Dire Wolf Lv. 5, a mob that shouldn't have appeared until night time. It was an aggressive mob, so the minute it saw me it lunged towards me with its mouth wide open.

I quickly dodged the wolf's first bite and retaliated with a Horizontal, knocking its HP down to about 40%. While still stuck in the ½ second cooldown phase, the wolf bit me on the arm, lowering my HP down to about 85%. Growling with frustration, I slashed at the wolf with another Horizontal, killing it.

LEVEL UP!

I dismissed the rewards window and the system notification window and continued my way through the forest, heading deeper and deeper into its depths. Mobs continuously fell to my flashing blade, and soon I reached the end of the forest where the miniboss dwelled. I was now Lv. 8, and even I knew that challenging the Lv. 10 miniboss was not such a great idea. However, since I was driven by impulse, I stepped into the massive clearing and faced the miniboss.

A loud roar rippled through the air and a massive shape loomed above me. Slowly I glanced up at the massive wolf that shook its hairy silvery-white body and howled at me. A red cursor accompanied by 2 HP bars and a name Laycoan the Werewolf appeared above it. The wolf howled once more before pouncing on me. I swiftly rolled to one side and slashed at it with a Horizontal, but its first HP bar only decreased by 10%. The werewolf howled again and slashed its claws across my torso, lowering my HP down to 60%.

I swore. This monster just wouldn't give up. I activated a new sword skill that I had obtained, Vertical Arc. Two verticals chained together onto the head of the miniboss activated the 'Critical Strike' mechanism, lowering its HP down to one bar, and even then that bar was at 95%. Laycoan struck at me again, this time lowering me down to 20% HP. I gritted my teeth but jumped up to dodge another attack and activated Vertical Arc one last time on its head, smashing through its body on the way down and reducing the miniboss into a shower of polygonal fragments of light.

Another LEVEL UP! notification popped up, as well as a rewards screen that gave me 10,000 Col and a new coat called the 'Werewolf's Cloak'. I scanned the coat's properties and saw that it gave me significant defense buffs and increased my speed quite a bit. I quickly opened up my inventory and equipped the new coat.

It was a silvery-white color and had black lines going down the front of the jacket as well as a wolf's face imprinted on the back in a crimson-red outline. Deciding that this would be my primary armour until later floors, I opened up my player menu to logout.

 _It's not there!_

I frowned. A missing logout button was surely going to affect the game's fanbase and popularity. If there was no logout button, all of the people currently logged in wouldn't be able to exit the virtual world, leaving us trapped in here until a GM let us out by shutting down the game servers.

Suddenly a bell tolled, breaking me out of my various thoughts. I closed my eyes quickly as a bright blue flash of light abruptly enveloped me and the world turned into a hue of sapphire.

When I reopened my eyes I realized that I was back in the arena of the starting city along with the other 10,000 players that logged in during first launch. Tidbits of conversation between players drifted through the air, and I only managed to catch some of it.

"H-hey, what's going on here?"

"I dunno, but it's kinda freaking me out a little…"

"Are we gonna be able to logout now?"

"I-I'm scared…"

"What exactly is going on?"

"Is this an event?"

After I understood the important pieces of information in the conversations, I tuned them out and instead refocused my attention to other places, trying to figure out what exactly had happened. Slowly I pushed my way through the confused crowd of players and reached the edge of the arena.

When I tried to exit the arena, however, something peculiar happened. My feet and hands touched some invisible wall and blocked my exit. I tried again, but like last time, my feet and hands met some wall and I was unable to leave the arena.

 _Exactly what is the meaning of this?_

Various thoughts flew through my mind and the only explanation of this occurrence was that some game event was about to start, or a system announcement.

Just as that thought entered my mind, the bell tolling stopped, and a silence descended upon the crowd. Suddenly, someone shouted "Look! Up there!" and all of our eyes locked onto the single blood-red tile seemingly hovering in the air.

WARNING: SYSTEM ANNOUNCEMENT

Just then the single tile started blinking repeatedly and soon it duplicated itself across the virtual sky, covering all of us with a crimson sky of system announcement warning signs.

A seemingly dismembered blob of gooey substance started dripping down from the blood-red tiles, and some players whimpered pathetically as the blob formed into the shape of a massive GM uniform, with shadow covering face, parts of the arm, and feet. Two white gloves protruded out from within the sleeves of the massive and bulky GM uniform, and not a single inch of the figure looming above us seemed human.

"Welcome players, to my world." The GM raised his hands as he spoke to us.

' _To my world?'_ I thought. _What does he mean by that?_

"My name is Kayaba Akihiko, and as of right now, I am the sole person able to change and manipulate this world."

 _Kayaba Akihiko!_ A gasp of surprise escaped my lips, and numerous thoughts raced through my mind at once. Kayaba Akihiko was a game developer and genius prodigy of programming. He was the main developer of the Nerv Gear, and Sword Art Online was the game that he developed himself. He didn't have many published interviews, but I had written copies of all the ones that were published.

A well-known genius at even an early age, Kayaba was the man who personally brought the game company ARGUS through a breakthrough in gaming technology and introduced the brand new VRMMO genre to the world. I was shaken out of my thoughts when Kayaba's ominous voice continued his speech.

"You all may have realized that the Logout button is missing from your player menus. I am here to tell you now that this is no bug or accident; it is a feature of Sword Art Online. I repeat, this is a feature of Sword Art Online."

 _What?!_ For some reason, my brain had a little difficulty comprehending what Kayaba just said. _Feature of SAO? What could that possibly mea-_

Cold dread filled my veins as I realized what this meant. Slowly, people all around me also began to realize what this meant for them. I had an inkling of suspicion of how the rest of the speech would go, but I hoped with all my might that I would be wrong for once.

"The only way for you players to be logged out is for you to conquer this castle. Once you have conquered this castle everyone will be free to leave."

My eyes widened in confirmation as I realized that my suspicions were about to be proven true. If this game really was what I thought it was, I needed to escape this crowd the minute the barrier lifted up. Kayaba was about to announce the worst part of the speech soon, I just knew it.

"In addition, any tampering, attempt to remove or break the Nerv Gear from a player's head will result in death. The Nerv Gear will emit high frequency waves directed towards your brain, frying it and thus ending your life. This information was disclosed to the public before this announcement, but some families have already attempted to remove the headgear. The result…"

I held my breath. _Please don't say it please don't say it please don't say it…_

 _"216 players have currently retired permanently from both worlds, this one and the real one."_

Gasps of surprise, shock, anger and despair rippled through the unbelieving crowd. I just gazed up at the once-gallant creator of this game, and realized that logging into this game was the worst decision that I made in all 14 years of my life.

"These deaths have already been broadcasted through all of the social media and news sites, reducing the chances of this happening to you to 0. This will allow you the peace of mind to concentrate and clear this game. Also, I shall advise you all to be aware of your remaining HP. That HP amount is your remaining life force. There is no longer any way to revive a player once dead, and once dead in this world the Nerv Gear shall simultaneously emit powerful microwaves, frying your brain and ending your life."

Cries of protest and anger emanated from the crowd.

" _Who the hell do you think you are?!"_

 _"You're insane?!"_

" _Let us out already!"_

 _"We're never gonna be able to clear this game!"_

" _Don't screw with us!"_

I shook my head slowly. This situation was soon about to erupt into nothing but chaos if Kayaba didn't speak up. Many things flitted through my mind, but only one thought really stuck: _WHY?_

As if sensing my utter confusion, Kayaba continued his hideous speech.

"Now, you all may be wondering ' _Why? Why would Kayaba Akihiko, creator of Sword Art Online do all of this? Is it for ransom? Is it for some kind of revenge?'_ "

I snorted unbelievingly at those reasons. Kayaba had enough money to live rich his entire life without working another day, and he had no reason to trap 10,000 random players for any sort of revenge.

"It is none of those reasons. My goal has already been achieved; that is, to create a world and meddle with it. One last little thing. I have included a gift from me to you in your inventories. You may go look at it now."

The chiming of player menus being opened resonated within the arena as 10,000 lives were about to be changed forever.

I opened up my inventory and found the extra item that Kayaba had mentioned before. Hand Mirror was its name, and the item description of it was completely vague about its use. I warily materialized the item and held it in my hand.

I stared down into the mirror, and saw my avatar looking back at me. Bloodred eyes peered back at me from a face that resembled an anime hero's, and I finally got a good glimpse at my avatar in first person point of view.

Suddenly, I was once more consumed in a bright blue light, and when it died down I was confused greatly.

 _HUH?!_

The previously large crowd of dashing-looking males and beautiful females had changed into a large crowd of people in armor and clothes. The height, weight, appearance and gender of all the players had changed dramatically. For one thing, the number of females had decreased drastically, and the average girth of the players had increased by quite an amount.

Everywhere I looked, people seemed different than they used to be, as if…

 _Oh no!_

I quickly looked into my own hand-held mirror, and beheld my own face, in _real life_! Now, dark violet eyes tinged with a hint of crimson stared at me from behind a few locks of pure-black hair that dropped down to my eyes. My bishounen face reflected the confused and surprised thoughts that ran through my already- befuddled head.

That item that Kayaba had given us before must have utilized the information about our physical stature and structure from the sensors in the headgear and the information gathered from the initial calibration process to replicate our real-life appearances and statures.

When the initial shock died down, Kayaba spoke up one last time.

"This is to remind you that this is not a game anymore for any of you. This is now your current reality, and if you wish to escape this reality, work hard to defeat all 100 floors and be granted the freedom that you all fought for. This concludes the grand opening of Sword Art Online. I wish you all luck, players."

With that final sentence, Kayaba's GM avatar dispersed into crimson light polygons, and for a brief time silence permeated the air.

Then, one handheld glass mirror fell and broke, shattering into countless tiny polygons. It was then that the chaos really started.

Ignoring the cries and shouts of the people around me, I hurriedly walked out of the arena and headed towards the northern gate, where the next town to the labyrinth was.

"Well shit, this all's gone down to hell…" I muttered. This was going to be one interesting adventure alright, but I doubted that it would be any fun at all. Right now my priority was to level up quickly and get the best equipment that I could to increase my survival probability.

I threw one last fleeting glance at the chaotic mess of people behind me and trudged into the sunset, my new cloak billowing out from behind me.

Several hours after I had left the starting city, the sun had descended and plunged the world in a dark asylum for dangerous monsters. I was almost at my destination, a little town quite some ways from the starting city called Horunka Village. If my previous information from the beta was correct, it was there that I had the chance to obtain the best longsword for the first 3 or 4 floors. However, due to its strength, it was a one-time only quest, so once the quest was finished and the sword awarded, no other players would be able to get the sword.

Spending time outside of a safe zone during nighttime was definitely a death sentence for novice players and such, but I was already an experienced elite- I was the player who had been ranked #1 out of all 1,000 beta testers during the beta, and at Lv. 26 on floor 10, only one player had come close to beating me. His name alluded my mind for a while until it came back to me. _Kirito. Yes, his avatar name was Kirito._ I smiled slightly to myself and recalled the end of the beta, when Kirito and I had just gotten to know each other. He was the second-best player in the beta, and he had an epithet, the "Black Swordsman," after his full-on black attire.

" _I'll be in at first launch, so shoot over a friend request when I'm still on. We can continue this together, and be the first ones to clear all 100 floors!"_

 _I smiled and replied in kind. "Yeah! Well, the beta's almost over and the GMs are sure to kick us off the server soon, but I'll definitely be seeing you around when the official game comes out. Be sure to not forget me, Black Swordsman-sama!"_

 _Kirito scoffed. "Forget the demon who was able to defeat me in a duel? No way! I won't ever forget you!"_

 _We teased each other some more, but soon an announcement rang out that the GMs were starting to kick off all remaining players still logged in._

 _The two of us grinned at each other, slapped hands in farewell and logged out._

I was brought out of my reminiscing when a Dire Wolf lunged at me. Without breaking stride I activated Vertical Arc and cut down the wolf.

It took me 2 months to get to Lv. 26 and for Kirito to reach Lv. 24, but I doubted that either of us would take half as long this time to get at least that far. Back then we had no knowledge about the game until multiple experiences of dying taught us important lessons, so leveling was extremely slow. Every boss fight wiped out at least ¾ of the raid, but back then no one had the fear of dying.

Now, with the situation mediating us between life and death, progress through the game was bound to be very slow and careful. I thought about sending Kirito a friend request to check up on him, but decided not to as he was probably currently dealing with his own problems.

A loud howling filled the air around me, and I paused for a moment to analyze my current surroundings. I was very close to Horunka, but not close enough to see the entrance gate. All around me, wolfs with glowing crimson eyes stared hungrily at me, lusting after my blood and my death.

There were approximately 20 Lv. 8 Dire Wolfs surrounding me, and I doubted that at this level I could take them all on at the same time.

I cursed at myself. Naturally, at nighttime more dangerous and high-leveled mobs came prowling around, and I had forgotten that they traveled in large packs as well.

If a player were high enough in level, such hunting at night could be very beneficial, as mobs at night dropped increased loot, col and xp, but the significant gains were backed by the dangerously high risks of getting killed.

Currently, I would have stayed within the boundaries of a safe zone until I was well above the average levels of the mobs to challenge entire packs of them, but right now I didn't have that luxury. 20 pairs of beady glowing eyes focused on me, and I realized that if I didn't bring them all down, I would go down first.

And I just couldn't let that be an option.

Screaming with an intense ferocity, I leapt directly for one of the wolves while keeping an eye out for the others' movements. Just as I suspected, the second I pounced on one of the wolves, the rest reacted in sync.

I cut down one wolf, dodged past the snapping jaws of 15 others, let 5 sink their fangs into my left arm, and cut down another wolf. I leapt out of the snarling fray to check on my current situation.

2 wolfs down, 18 left, my sword still intact, and my HP at 85% for taking 5 hits from the wolfs. Each bite only took away 3% of my HP, but that was still a lot to me. Back in the beta I was used to getting hit exactly zero times every time I fought against mobs.

I then leapt back at the pack, cutting down another wolf before back-slamming into the others, preventing them from attacking me and knocking them away. In their imminent confusion I cut down another 3 wolfs before backing up to survey the damage I had dealt to them.

Great. Now 6 wolfs were down, 14 were left and my HP was still at 75%. I rummaged quickly through my inventory and gulped down the one HP-low potion that I received since the beginning of the game. I made a mental note to myself to stock up on some potions in Horunka.

While my HP gradually filled up, I ran in and killed one more wolf, got bitten 3 times and killed off one more wolf when my cooldown time was over. By this time the wolves were tired of waiting for me to attack, and attacked me first. 12 snarling jaws snapped at me, but only 2 of them found purchase on my body. I took down 3 more wolves before retreating a bit to reassess my situation.

9 angry and irritated wolves remained, while my HP was nearing the 60% yellow zone mark. However, I could still see my remaining HP rise steadily, so I knew that the health potion was still in effect, but not for much longer.

I leapt in once more and didn't care how many times I got bitten until all of them were gone. 10 minutes later, I was on my back groaning and literally glowing red from all of the injuries that I had been dealt while fighting the wolves. All of them were gone, and my Col balance, inventory and xp swelled greatly from the rewards, but my HP was in the deadly red zone, with about 10% or less remaining. I had to get to Horunka immediately if I wanted to survive tonight. I ran all the way to the town without stopping, pausing only for a few seconds at a time to catch my breath before running again.

When I arrived at the town gate, I stopped for an instant to check my current stats.

Krystor: Lv. 11 HP: 10,500 Agility: 20 Strength: 10

Skills: One-handed sword, - Col: 15, 250

I quickly selected a new skill for my newly opened skill slot, Auto Battle Regen.

This skill was an important one to me, as I focused my build primarily on speed and only some on strength. When I had the chance to at Horunka, I'd buy two daggers and take up the skill Daggers once I hit Lv. 20. Since I was ambidextrous, I would be able to activate sword skills easily with both hands and execute them perfectly. In addition, I discovered that a new set of sword skills would become available to me once my Daggers skill hit a mastery of over 600. This new set of skills would only be available to players if the system recognized that the player was capable of using both hands with weapons, and the skills had massive combo attacks with relatively low cooldown times, the largest being a 27-hit combo skill with a cooldown of 3 seconds.

Anyways, the Auto Battle Regen skill would replenish my HP much faster than the slow system self-regenerate, so I wouldn't have to spend so much col on potions and health crystals to fill up any lost HP that I incurred through my battles.

I sauntered over wearily to the nearest NPC merchant selling his wares on the road and purchased 20 potions for 250 col and 2 two-and-a-half feet long iron daggers for 2000 Col before heading towards the only inn in the town.

The inn was empty of players excluding me, as was the entire town. I didn't expect any players to come in to Horunka until mid-morning tomorrow, even if they were beta testers. The only person that I knew who would come so early to Horunka aside from me was Kirito, but I doubted that he would get here until tomorrow.

I went up to the innkeeper and got a room for 20 Col a night before leaving to activate the quest that I was hell-bent on completing first. I went over to a little NPC-run house next to the inn and walked inside.

Inside the house was an old NPC woman tending a massive cauldron of boiling water. When I entered she looked up at me and got up at once. She came over to me and said in a worried voice, "Hello, traveling swordsman. I would normally welcome you in my house with a smile and some refreshments, but my little Agatha has fallen terribly ill and I feel terrible that there is nothing that I can do to help her. All I can offer you is a cup of water. Is that fine?"

I smiled warmly and replied, "Yes, thank you. Water would be fine."

I watched as the old woman gave me her gratitude for being so understanding and hobbled over to scoop up a cup of water for me from a wooden ladle. She handed me the cup and I quietly sipped at it as she informed me about her granddaughter's illness.

"My little Agatha's had this terrible illness for the past few days, and she's showing no symptoms of getting better. The only remedy I can think of for this disease is beyond my grasp, as it is hidden away somewhere in a forest a little ways from this town. Now, normally I would go ahead and search for this curing ovule myself, but it has been plagued by monsters for a while now, and I have no way of fending off the monsters myself."

She finished her little pre-programmed dialogue and a large, golden question mark appeared above her head. I approached her then and asked, "Is there anything I can do to help?"

These words triggered the quest and the old woman replied immediately.

"Yes! In fact, there is! If you help me and bring me back the ovule hidden in the monster-infested forest, I can reward you handsomely. Will you help me?"

I smiled internally and said, "Of course I will." The question mark disappeared and a large golden exclamation mark appeared over her head.

"Oh, thank you, traveling swordsman. Thank you very much."

I nodded my head slightly and headed out the door. I hurried over to the inn and entered the room that I rented. I would only be staying here tonight; tomorrow after I finished the quest I would head over to the next village to complete its series of quests.

I opened my player menu with a sweep of my hand and opened the Quest window to review the quest terms.

NEW QUEST! SECRET MEDICINE OF THE FOREST

DESCRIPTION: VENTURE INTO THE FOREST TO FIND THE OVULE. DEFEAT LITTLE NEPENTS IN THE FOREST UNTIL ONE OF THEM DROPS AN ITEM-LIKE OVULE. RETURN THIS OVULE TO NPC MARTHA TO RECEIVE QUEST REWARDS

I dismissed the window and collapsed onto the bed, utterly and completely exhausted. The clock at the lower right side of my vision said that it was currently 3:30 AM. I sighed. Today I gained 10 levels after almost 12-13 hours of nonstop grinding, but that carelessness almost killed me. Tomorrow I would have to exercise more caution when outside the safe zones. Deciding to sleep, I set an alarm for 7:30 AM so I could get the quest done by at least noon the next day, as I knew that the quest would take a lot of time to complete. I tapped on the light next to my bed and pressed on the POWER OFF button and drifted off to sleep.

The loud blaring of an annoying alarm woke me up harshly and I swatted blindly at an imaginary clock that wasn't there. Still half-asleep, I wondered to myself _'Where the heck am I? This isn't my bedroom; I had 2 large windows in mine, this one only has one!'_

As my consciousness slowly came back to me, however, I remembered where I was and the dire situation that I was in. "A death game, huh…" I muttered quietly to myself for a while about how stupid this game was and such, but quickly recalled what I was waking up so early to accomplish.

I quickly equipped all of my battle gear and ate a quick breakfast of tasteless eggs and ham to sate my gnawing hunger and headed out to the forest mentioned by the old NPC lady, the Nepent Forest.

Aptly named, this particular forest was inhabited by large, leafy mobs called Nepents. Now, there were two different kinds of Nepents. There was the Little Nepent, which was exceedingly common in the forest and contained the ovule that I needed to complete the quest, and there was the Large Nepent, which was basically a larger version of the Little Nepent, and gave more items, xp and col for each kill. Unfortunately, Large Nepents were pretty rare and only a few spawned in the forest during the day.

I entered the forest and came across my first mob. A noticeable difference between this forest and the one I did before the dreadful announcement, however, was that these monsters had much higher level averages. Whereas in the Linden Forest the average monster level was around 3, 4 or even 5, the monster average levels here were at least 6, but never exceeding 10.

I slashed through one Little Nepent with a quick Horizontal, but it only caused the mob to lose half its HP. Growling with irritation at its toughness, I quickly cut it down with a follow-up Horizontal. Right as I finished up that mob, another leafy tentacle lashed out at me, missing me by a hair's breadth. I snapped my head in the direction that the tentacle came from, and saw Lv. 9 Large Nepent in front of me.

"Oh, boy. Look at my luck…" I slashed at it with a Vertical Arc followed up by a Horizontal before it dissolved into countless tiny polygons.

It was nearly 11:00 AM before I managed to track down a Little Nepent with a flower on it, but once I found one, I was hell-bent on not letting it escape. I must have destroyed hundreds of Nepents since I started this crazy quest, and although I enjoyed the amount of Col and items that piled up in my inventory, I knew that this quest had gone on far too long.

When I finally cornered the Little Nepent, I realized with a start that there was actually another Little Nepent guarding it- one that had a fruit on it.

Now, judging from the info I knew from the beta, the flower dropped the ovule that I needed but the fruit emitted a sweet smell that attracted a whole bunch of Nepents, both little and large.

I quickly snuck up on the Little Nepent that had the flower and killed it, obtaining the ovule, but when I slashed at the other Nepent I completely forgot that it had a fruit.

Suddenly, I was doing a running race between a mass of plant-like mobs and myself. Once I reached the outer edges of the forest, I turned around and faced off the 20 or 30 Nepents that had been gathered together because of the stupid fruit.

"Oh, boy. This is NOT gonna go well…"

20 minutes later, I stumbled once again into the town with my HP in the red zone, but this time it was more like 5% remaining instead of 10-15%. I felt like I fought for an eternity, all of those precious minutes wasting away until my HP fell to the red zone.

When that happened, there were 2 Little Nepents left and I honestly had no idea whether or not I was going to survive. I roared and did a Vertical Arc on one of them, reducing it to polygonal shards of light, but the other one managed to get a good, solid hit on me, bringing my HP from 10% down to around 5%.

Red lights were flashing in my vision and I felt a bit woozy, but after I got a hold of myself I slashed mercilessly at the nepent without using any sword skills, but my onslaught of attacks kept it from attacking me and slowly but surely the Nepent dissolved as well.

Right as I dealt the finishing blow to the Nepent, my Beginner's Longsword broke and dissolved, seeing as I used up all of the sword's durability and never had it repaired at a blacksmith's place.

Well, for now that was fine because I was about to receive a better sword as a reward for finishing the quest, along with other rewards.

While I walked over to the house where the NPC Martha was, I quickly drank a HP-low health potion to restore part of my remaining HP. When I entered the house the potion's effects wore off, but my HP kept steadily increasing due to my Auto-Battle Regen skill. In fact, that skill was probably the only reason why I was still alive now after fighting so many Little Nepents at once. Anyone else in my position back then would have been dead.

Nevertheless, currently I was alive and frankly, that was all that mattered now. Worrying about potentially dying could happen later, after I obtained the reward for this quest.

I walked over to the old NPC woman, whom still had the golden exclamation mark over her head, signifying that no one else had completed the task before I did.

"Hello again. I've brought you your ovule from the forest."

Those specific words triggered the reception of the item and the completion of the quest, and as I materialized the ovule and gave it to the woman, my insides filled up with an unspeakable joy and I eagerly awaited the rewards.

The woman gratefully accepted the ovule and put it in the large cauldron of boiling water. Minutes later after she stirred the water some more she filled a little cup with the medicine and brought it into a door next to the room I was in currently.

Honestly, I was kind of shocked, because back in the beta that door had been locked and stayed locked. Here in the official version, it seemed that once the quest had been finished, the door leading to the next room would be unlocked.

I followed the old NPC woman into the room next doors and saw a little frail girl sitting up in her bed.

I caught my breath. Truly, Kayaba did an amazing job replicating this little sick girl. If it weren't for the little white cursor above her head signifying an NPC and the lack of an HP bar, I could have easily mistaken this little girl for a player instead.

Anyways, the old lady walked over to where Agatha was sitting, and said, "Agatha, this young swordsman brought back the ovule that helped make this medicine. Here, drink this. It will make you feel better again."

The NPC Agatha accepted the cup and drank its contents. When the cup was empty, she handed back the cup to Martha and her frail face suddenly changed into a happy, smiling one. She turned and faced me, saying, "Onii chan, than you, onii chan. I'm so happy!"

The bright, cheerful face and grateful words rang in my mind, and suddenly I remembered a scene just like this one, only this was from the real world.

 _Kureha, my sister, had fallen severely ill one day when she came back from school. The doctor said that it was a difficult disease to cure, but he said that Kureha was sure to pull through in the end. He did say, however, that a little ginger tea would greatly reduce the pains that constantly racked her body._

 _Overcome with sorrow by what happened to Kureha, I immediately went to the kitchen to make some ginger tea for her. When I finished the tea and brought it over to her, she sat up in bed, smiled warmly at me, and said, "Onii chan, thank you, onii chan."_

I was brought out of my memories as Agatha asked me in a worried voice, "Onii chan, are you alright? Why are you crying?"

I quickly wiped away my tears and smiled at her. "It's nothing, Agatha. Just a little personal matter. Don't worry, ok?"

Agatha's face brightened up and she smiled. "If onii-chan says that he's ok, then its alright. Good luck on your future journeys, onii-chan. Don't die out there."

I smiled warmly at the little girl. "Don't worry, Agatha. I won't die out there, because I'm very strong."

Somewhere during the course of our conversation Martha had gone back into the other room, and she emerged from the room minutes later. In her hands was a long wooden box, and two smaller boxes balanced precariously on it.

"Here, take these legendary items. It is the least I can give you for the help that you have given us. In the long box is the legendary Anneal Blade, a powerful sword that I hope will serve you well. In one of the other boxes is a pair of elongated daggers that we have carried down through our family for generations. They are named Shadow's Wrath, and are very powerful, even more so than the sword here. In addition, the other box is a pair of gloves studded with black diamonds, and its toughness is incomparable to other gloves offered anywhere on this floor.

Agatha got out of her bed and reached under her bed. "Onii-chan, for being such a kind and benevolent person, I offer you these."

She revealed a pair of shiny and sleek black boots with red outlines on them. "They used to be mine, but I think I'll be better off if I stay in this town and care for grandma instead. You can have them."

A screen popped up in front of me and my quest info updated itself. Quest: Secret Medicine of the Forest COMPLETED!

A rewards screen popped up in front of me later that read:

Col: 20,000

Anneal Blade

Shadow's Wrath

Lucifer's Gloves

BONUS ITEM:

Boots of Darkness

I received another level up from the quest, and I felt happy to have finally finished the tedious yet rewarding quest.

I equipped all of my new gear. My old black leather boots were replaced by sleek black metallic ones that felt lighter than my old ones, my old leather gloves were replaced by the black diamond-studded gloves and my new Anneal Blade appeared in my hands. I placed the sword on my back and strapped on the sword sheath strap. Finally I materialized my new amazing daggers. I strapped them to the back of my waist with the handles facing outwards, like the amazing heroes did in the animes that I watched.

Unfortunately, since I was currently only Lv. 14, I still had 6 more levels to go until I could get the Daggers skill set. Until then, I had to stick with either slashing at the enemy with weaker damage, or use my Anneal Blade until I reached Lv. 20. Either way, I was quickly reaching my floor 1 goal, and after that I would be able to get a headstart on my floor 2 goals. I thanked the NPCs for everything that they gave me and left the house, heading directly for the next village.

My final destination, however, would be the city Tolbana, where the 1st floor labyrinth was.


	2. Birth of the Beater

**Hey! So I'm back, and I only have this chapter up so soon because I already had it written out. Also, I'd like some feedback. Should I have long chapters like this and update every couple weeks, or short chapters and update more frequently?**

 **: Thank you for your review! The daggers that Krystor has obtained are only B-rank, but for first floor they'd be considered 'legendary.' He will, however, obtain real legendary equipment later on!**

 **Wvdweegh: I will try my best to update as soon as possible, but I'm still deciding whether I want to do long chapters with longer update periods or shorter chapters with quicker update. Thank you for the review!**

Chapter 2

Tolbana was a strange sight for those who had been traveling and living in the towns which provided wooden huts as a sleeping place and wooden buildings for other purposes. Some of the towns didn't even have a shop there; just a sign announcing the town's name and two or three NPCs guarding small shacks that players slept in. These towns usually had a quest or two to complete, so players frequented these 'towns' only to get the col and xp. Once the quest was complete, they'd get out of the town and immediately head to the next one to find quests to complete or monsters to fight.

I myself stayed in these villages or towns only to complete the quests or gain some extra col for helping the NPCs with some problem that they always seemed to have. Stopping only three times at a few medium-sized villages to rest up for the night, I reached Tolbana in 4 days. Since then my level had gone up to Lv. 17 and my mastery skill for One-handed sword and Auto-battle Regen had gone up to 280 and 300, respectively.

At 8:50 AM when I entered Tolbana, I could tell that it was a big town designed to hold many players, most likely for the players that were working on clearing the 1st floor. I first visited the NPC blacksmith to upgrade my sword and daggers all +3 before walking to the most comfortable-looking inn in town.

I walked past an inn called the 'Phoenix Lair' and immediately noticed the difference between this and the other inns in town. For one thing, this inn looked like it was furnished specially for those who had enough col to throw in the air and still have plenty left over.

The air here had a calming scent and there was a furnished carpet leading up to the steps of the inn. The glass doors revealed an exquisite interior of polished mahogany stairs leading up to a second floor that I couldn't see. A water fountain was placed at the side of the road, spilling out streams of water that flew out of the opening in jets of sparkling crystal-clear water. Polished vases and antiques were placed around the interior of the inn and NPC valets stood at attention near the staircase. There was even an NPC-run bar in the inn, and information NPCs walked around occasionally talking with each other.

At the sparkling glass doors two NPC guards stood at attention, reminding me of those high-end apartment suites in Tokyo that were always the mainstays of famous people from other countries visiting Japan.

I took a deep breath before walking to the doors of the inn. Before I could reach the handles, however, both of the guards walked towards me.

"Do you have a reservation here sir?" One of the guards asked.

A screen popped up in front of me and I read the contents. Basically, this was a very expensive inn that gave excellent quality service for those who stayed there and cost about 3,000 Col a night, which was about 50x more expensive than any other inn in Tolbana. I thought about it, and decided that I'd take a room in this place once I had earned more Col.

I left the inn and went around the city, activating all of the quests that were available there. After I made a complete circuit around the city, I looked at the number of quests that had accumulated in my quest page.

I had a total of 45 quests; 30 of the quests had to do with killing this amount of mobs and returning to collect the reward, 5 of them had to do with killing mobs and collecting a set amount of materials from the fallen mobs, 8 had to do with taking this item to that place in the city and delivering it, and finally, 2 quests had to do with completing certain dungeons.

The dungeon completion quests were normally for parties to complete, but they were not required. If a soul were brave enough to complete the quest solo, all of the Col and xp and extra items would be given to the solo player instead of being split between the party members. This was how I managed to get so far ahead of the rest of the players in the beta, and this was how I was going to get so far ahead of the other players here.

After completing 15 of the quests that I had, it was already 11:30 PM and I decided to call it a day. I had been alternating between finishing up quests and farming mobs all day, and by the end of the day I was 20% away from reaching Lv. 18. The very best of best except for me would probably be arriving in Tolbana tomorrow, and the rest of the good players would probably start trickling into the city in 2 or 3 more days. By then I was aiming to start mapping out the 1st floor labyrinth not far from Tolbana.

Accurate to my prediction, the players that seemed to have adapted to this game the quickest arrived in Tolbana at around noon the next day. By the time the second wave of players arrived, I had finished all 45 quests, leaving me at Lv. 22. By then I had found the 1st floor labyrinth and started daily grinding drills from morning till night, working on raising my levels and increasing my stash of Col.

One month had passed since the beginning of the game, and the first floor boss had yet to be found. I myself searched long and hard in the labyrinth for any signs of the doors that marked the entrance to the boss's lair, but for the past 25 days my searchings ended up fruitless and in vain. However, my levels and Col soared into the high heavens due to the intensive amount of grinding that I did.

Life for me was going good, until I had the decency to stop by a store to restock on some health potions in preparation for my next grind session. When I entered the shop, it was full of people talking with each other, trading items and having a good time, until a young boy ran in. I had just finished buying my usual batch of 20x health-high potions when he came stumbling in the shop, panting heavily and out of breath.

"Wow, boy, calm down before ya get the rest of us uneasy, eh?" A man reprimanded the boy harshly.

"A-ah! It's horrible, it's horrible, this game's going to be the end of us all!" The boy shouted.

He sounded terrified, and his hands shook as several people tried to get him calmed down so he could clarify what he just blurted out.

When he was visibly calmer, the boy revealed a piece of horrible news. "As of now, 2,000 players are dead. 2,000 people have been killed. I don't know what killed them, but it's a fact. You know how there's a list of all 10,000 players on the Monument of Life? Well, a new inscription was carved into the black marble a couple days ago. 'Those who have perished in this world will have their names crossed out, the cause of death inscribed, and the date that they died written here.' Then, two days ago a new inscription appeared. 'As of now, exactly 2,000 players have perished. Be careful on your journeys, players.' I can't help but think when we're ever gonna beat this dang death game. It's insane…"

The boy's voice faded away from my ears as I pushed my way through the throng of players in the shop and ran outside, heading towards the labyrinth.

 _Today. Today I'm going to find the boss's lair. To show everyone that this game CAN BE BEATEN!_

 _Sryahhhh!_ Another Kobold Ruin Trooper fell to my blade, and a LEVEL UP! screen appeared in front of me. On a whim I opened my player menu and checked my stats.

Krystor: Lv. 26 HP: 25,500 Agility: 42 Strength: 18

Skills: One-handed Sword, Auto-Battle Regen, Daggers Col: 106,500

I sighed and closed my stat window. The leveling curve for the retail version was insane; in the beta if I trained as much as I did now my level would be at least Lv. 37, if not higher. Right now I would assume that the average player in Aincrad would be around Lv. 5 or Lv. 6; the average player actively clearing in the labyrinth would be around Lv. 15 or 16.

I saw two more Ruin Kobold Troopers running towards me with their maces raised high above their heads and I readied myself for their attacks. One used a Horizontal while the other used a Vertical. Normally, any player would be in trouble. Dodging to the left or right would cause them to be hit with the Kobold executing the Horizontal, and jumping up would put the player in the path of the Vertical. However I did a backflip and landed just out of reach of both attacks.

I quickly took out my two daggers and slashed at both with two perfectly timed horizontals at once, severing both troopers' right hands. The maces clobbered uselessly to the ground and I decapitated them both with two more swift Horizontals. I walked a bit further before hearing the faint sounds of metal clashing against metal- the sure sign of a battle.

I ran towards the sound and came across a scene that confused me. A lithe figure covered by a maroon cloak jabbed at three Ruin Kobold Troopers with an iron rapier. The sounds of twinkling glass indicated the death of two troopers, but right as the second trooper burst apart in countless tiny polygons of light, the iron rapier broke and the blow of the last remaining trooper sent the figure flying across the hall. The figure crumpled against the wall of the labyrinth and his HP went down to the yellow mark.

 _Oh crap!_

I ran swiftly towards the last trooper and destroyed it with a Vertical Arc. I crouched near the collapsed figure and deduced that he was either asleep or unconscious. I wasn't sure whether or not the figure was a guy or girl, but I stood over him protectively nonetheless.

When the figure came to, he let out a squeal of surprise. Well, now that I heard the voice I knew that it was a girl under that cloak.

"W-what w-were you doing to me while I was asleep, pervert?!"

I lazily looked over to her and gazed at her with an amused expression while she calmed down and analyzed me.

 _Hmph, smart girl. She knows to be wary of anyone and everyone. Whether or not that's a good thing for me or bad thing, I don't know yet. I'll just have to wait and see to find out._

I waved hesitantly at her judging gaze. "H-hey… what's up?"

My statement somehow got curved into a question when the girl quickly whipped out a rapier and pointed it at me threateningly. "Who are you and what are you doing here? You could have killed me while I was unconscious."

I rolled my eyes at her condescending tone. "Well, for starters, I'm Krystor. Second of all, I was here originally so that I could train and grind, but _someone_ ended up getting knocked unconscious before she could finish off the last of her opponents. She also managed to get herself knocked out, so I thought that I would stand watch over her and waste my precious time to make sure that no one PKed her. Are we clear now?"

She nodded hesitantly.

"Now, would you please be kind enough to tell me what the _hell_ you were doing out here in the labyrinth fighting _three_ monsters alone with terrible gear?"

The girl seemed indignant about my jurisdiction about her, and she said, "Well, if I die out here against monsters then it's ok, right? Because we'll never clear this game, and if we just wait in the starting town for help then we're just letting Kayaba win, right? So I came out here to fight against the monsters, and when my luck ran out I'd be able to die knowing that I died fighting against the monstrosity that trapped us in here."

I glanced warily at the girl. She seemed to be a good fighter even without good gear. "Say, when's the last time you were in a safe zone?"

The girl thought about it for a moment and replied, "One week ago."

"A WEEK?! YOU'VE BEEN HERE IN THIS LABYRINTH FOR SO LONG AND YOU HAVEN'T DIED YET?!"

I sighed deeply, and bluntly asked, "What's your level?"

"Lv. 22"

I sighed again, mumbling into my hand. "Of course, if you've been doing nothing but fighting for a whole week without stopping, I think you would've gotten to at least that level by now…"

I looked at her again. "Well, I guess you're in luck today. I'll take you back to Tolbana and you can rest up a bit before heading out here and grinding again, ok? And don't try to suicide by fighting monsters again. You say that we'll never clear the game? Well… we will. Because I'm going to be the one to clear it. You have my word. Stay alive until the game ends or I die, because I am going to clear this game, and I see that you have great potential. You'll go far in this game, but only if you regain your will to live and push on. Got it?"

The girl looked at me warily again before hesitantly nodding her head.

"Good. Now, shall we go? I have a suite in the 'Phoenix Lair', though I just got it today and I haven't been in the suite myself. You coming with me?"

I held out my hand, and she grabbed it with shyness.

"Come on, let's go."

People stared at the cloaked girl and I as we walked towards the 'Dragon Lair'. Only a few people dared to rent such an outrageously expensive place to live for a few nights, and even those people only rented out a suite for a night or two before ditching it for a cheaper one.

I had no problems with money, so I planned to stay in the inn until the second floor was unlocked. The NPC guards recognized me as one with a suite automatically, but stopped the girl because she wasn't recognized. I turned to the guards. "She's with me."

The guards nodded and let us through and into the inn. NPC attendants came over to us and asked if there was anything that we needed or wanted, but we politely declined. We walked over to the NPC bartender in the inn and ordered some drinks to freshen ourselves up.

The drinks arrived and I noticed that they didn't cost any col at all.

 _Guess it comes with the rental of a suite…_

We finished our drinks and walked up the stairs leading to the second floor and arrived at my room shortly after. I asked the girl if she needed any change of clothes or needed anything else, but she only said, "Just get me another maroon cloak. I'm fine other than that."

When we walked in however she noticed something peculiar about my bathroom in the suite. "I-is that a bath?"

I looked over to where she was pointing, and noticed the bathtub with a shower hose above it. "Eh? Yeah, there's a shower here. You want to use it?"

"Yes! Yes yes yes!"

The girl shrieked with delight and ran into the bathroom, closing the door behind her. Then, she opened the door and stared darkly at me. "And NO peeking in on me, got that?"

I nodded lazily, yawning while saying, "Of course, yeah yeah. Now are you gonna take that shower, or are you just going to stare at me?"

The girl let out a surprised squeak and slammed the door shut. I let out a loud sigh. "Ah, darn it. Now I've screwed up my training schedule! I was planning to get my level to 30 before the first boss fight, but at this rate I'll be lucky if I make it to Lv. 28 by then."

I grumbled a bit about getting off of my grinding schedule but then reminded myself that this girl was currently more important. She had real potential to be one of the best in this game, and I just couldn't let her go with that suicidal mindset that she currently harbored.

Almost half an hour later she reappeared in the doorway of the bathroom with her maroon cloak on. I was so bored that I had begun nodding off, until she snapped her fingers impatiently in my face.

"Hey, hey! Where's that cloak I asked you to get?"

I lazily opened my player menu to access my inventory, then sent over the cloak in a trade.

The girl ran into the bathroom, equipped the new cloak, and stepped outside of the bathroom once more before admiring the spacious suite that I had.

"Wow~ such a marvelous living place!"

Her voice was melodic and soft- one that I was sure to hear many more times. For now though, I was too absorbed in my own thoughts to be thinking about her voice.

"Hey, Krystor? It's almost dinner. You hungry?"

I nodded absentmindedly and got up, stretching. "Ahhh… yeah. Let's go get something to eat before visiting a blacksmith for your new weapon. Come on. I'll pay for dinner tonight."

The girl nodded slightly before slipping out the front door right after me.

As we roamed down the streets searching for a food vendor or pub to eat at, I noticed that a certain place had players entering in a constant stream of people. I nudged the girl and pointed towards the popular pub.

"Want to go there to eat?"

She shrugged her shoulders, and I took that as a yes. I led her over to the pub and walked in. The pub itself was spacious, with enough accommodations for what seemed like at least 100-150 players. Players everywhere chatted, talked and mingled with each other while eating and drinking some sort of virtual food and drink. Soft background music filtered through the air, producing a sense of tranquility and mild peace, nothing like the continuous battle that I went through every day.

The girl and I sat at a table and ordered our food from a NPC waiter. Minutes later, our food arrived and we barely stopped to say thanks before the meal before digging in. The food here wasn't exactly 'good', but since I hadn't eaten since this morning and the girl hadn't eaten in a week, we quickly finished all of our food in record speed. I paid for the meal after we finished and we left, heading towards the local NPC blacksmith.

"Neh, Krystor," she asked.

"What?"

"Why are you doing all of this for me? I mean, you could've just left me out there in the labyrinth for dead, or kill me for my items, or try to take advantage of me and bend me to your will; you have done nothing but help me. Why?"

I scratched the back of my head awkwardly and replied, "I don't want any other players that I see die, nor do I want them to do anything for me. I can provide for myself, and I want to keep it that way. I always help those that I can, and those that I can't I think of ways that I could help them the next time I encounter them. I don't want to take advantage of others, because that just means that I'm not strong enough to get where I want to be on my own."

The girl was silent for a few minutes as we continued walking before she spoke up again.

"You're strange."

That comment completely confused me. "Eh?"

The girl grumbled, "You're strange, not thinking like some other players that I've met before. But I like it that you're strange. Like someone that I can finally trust."

I smiled. The things that I said to the girl before were my true thoughts, but in the real world I never would have been able to work them past my lips. For that reason I was constantly alone and doing things solo, without anyone's help or interference.

Suddenly, I heard a different girl shouting. She sounded like a player blacksmith. "Get your weapons made and upgraded here! Lizbeth's smith shop!"

We walked around before pinpointing the location of the blacksmith to be right next to the 'Dragon's Lair'. A girl with a frilly maid outfit and short curls of pink hair was yelling out to the players in the street, trying to sell her wares and advertise her business.

 _Perfect. Now, if she's a high enough level, she may be able to help me and the girl…_

We walked over to her, and she beamed at us. "Welcome to Lizbeth's Smith Shop! What can I do for you two today?"

"Hm… Could I inquire your blacksmithing skill mastery level?"

The girl blinked in confusion before realizing what I was asking. "Oh! Yes, of course! My current blacksmithing level is…" Her face frowned. "Eh… it's only 390. Sorry, is that too low of a level?"

I smiled. That blacksmithing level so early into the game was a feat to be made. "No, actually it's not. I need three things to be upgraded, and I need the best rapier that you currently have."

Lizbeth frowned a bit before saying, "Hold on, please." She disappeared into the small shop that she had rented and the sounds of metal falling made me jump a bit. Then, she came out from the back of the shop and emerged with a shining silver rapier that had a fairly small hilt and a razor-sharp edge. Little decorations of yellow and orange were engraved onto the handle.

"Ah, this is currently the best that I have; I forged it from two B-Rank silver ingots that I got in a dungeon before. Its main attribute is speed, and the durability of it is amazing as well. It costs quite a bit, however…"

I was impressed by the blacksmith's ability. At this point in time, finding and successfully forging two B-Rank ingots together was a great accomplishment.

In Aincrad, there were 4 classes of ingots to be found. D-Rank was the most common, being the lowest grade of metal to be found. C-Rank was less common than D-Rank but still pretty common. B-Rank ingots were only obtainable on lower floors through large dungeons such as labyrinths and raid-sized dungeons. A-Rank ingots were virtually impossible to obtain on floors below 25, and when forged successfully the weapons created were pretty powerful. Finally, S-Rank ingots were only obtainable through massive dungeon raids and Boss drops only obtainable after floor 50. They produced the most powerful weapons in the game, and if forged successfully by a blacksmith with a very high mastery level, the resulting weapon or armour could be end-game level material.

My own Anneal Blade was a B-rank weapon, considered the most powerful sword found on the first floor. My new daggers, the Shadow's Wrath, were a B-Rank weapons as well. When I compared the specs between my two weapon types, I realized that both daggers together dealt more damage than my one sword. That kind of explained why the Kobold Sentinel Troopers fell to my Anneal Blade in two hits while the mobs fell to my daggers in one turn. Oh well.

"Well? How much does it cost?" I asked.

"U-um… 50,000 Col…"

I was about to say that I'd take it when Asuna said, "I'll buy it. This guy was going to get one for me anyways, but 50,000 col and a meal is a bit too much for someone to pay for a stranger. Anyways, 50,000 col, right? Here."

Asuna put in the required amount of col and sent it over in a trade to Lizbeth. When she received the money she sent over the rapier. "Thank you for your business!"

I rolled my eyes at the exchange, but turned back to Lizbeth. "Alright, now that she's got her rapier, I need you to do a little something for me. Is that alright?"

She nodded and I unstrapped my sword and daggers and handed them over to her. "I need my sword to be upgraded +6 with 3 on sharpness, 1 on durability and 2 on speed. Also, I would like my daggers to be upgraded +10 with 7 on speed and 3 on sharpness. I'll pay you any amount you wish for it, and I have all the necessary mats to upgrade all of my gear 100% success rate. I'd like my gear to be ready for pickup by tomorrow morning at around 8. Is that doable?"

Lizbeth nodded hesitantly and said, "I can do that."

I transferred the mats over and walked out of the shop with Asuna in tow.

I turned around and faced Asuna. "You have a place to sleep, right? Or a place to stay, at least?"

She shook her head sheepishly and said, "No, but I guess I could rent a room for the night at the 'Dragon's Lair'.

"It's really expensive," I warned her.

She smiled in response. "That's alright. I have enough money to spare for that." She started walking towards the 'Dragon's Lair'. Then she stopped and turned around. "Oh, I never gave you my name before. Sorry about that. My name is Asuna. Nice to meet you." She smiled again before walking towards the 'Dragon's Lair' again.

 _Asuna, eh? That's a nice name. It's got a good ring to it. Guess she was one of the few who chose their usernames to be their real names. Oh well…_

I shook off my wandering thoughts and walked towards the 'Dragon's Lair', and prepared myself mentally for tomorrow's continued grinding.

I woke up at the normal time, 7:30 AM, and proceeded to walk around the city a bit before eating a measly breakfast of 2 eggs and 5 pieces of virtual bacon. As I finished my meal in my room I heard a knocking.

"Yes? Who is it?"

Normally in SAO, people could not hear anything through closed doors. But when a player inside granted permission for other players to speak through the door, conversations could be made through closed doors.

"It's Asuna. I just got back from Liz's place, and she told me to tell you that your gear is all upgraded and ready to pick up."

"Alright, thanks Asuna."

I heard her footsteps receding from the door and I collapsed lazily back onto my bed before putting on my equipment. I walked out of the inn and headed next door to Lizbeth's Smith Shop. I opened the door to see Lizbeth busy hammering away at a rapier- Asuna's rapier. Finally, after she finished whatever she was doing to Asuna's rapier she noticed me standing awkwardly in the doorway.

"Oh, hey Krystor. I have all of your gear finished up. Here."

She handed over the sword and daggers. I tapped on each one, and the +6, +10 and +10 signs showed up on each weapon.

I strapped on all of my gear again and nodded my thanks to her. "Thanks, Lizbeth. How much will this cost?"

Lizbeth thought about it and said, "First of all, call me Liz from now on. Secondly, hm… Since you did provide me with all of the proper mats to upgrade them with, I'll cut the price for you down to 25,000 col. Sound fair?"

I nodded, transferred the col over to her, walked out of the shop and ran towards the labyrinth.

 _Ahhhhh~_ I groaned as a low yawn escaped my mouth. I wearily gazed out the window in my room and saw the sun steadily rising over the tops of the other buildings in Tolbana. 8:00 AM. That was the current time. For some reason today I felt extremely tired, so I decided to take half a day off and just take a tour of the town until lunch, then grind until 10 at night.

I ordered a bigger breakfast than usual at the bar in the 'Dragon's Lair' and sat down to leisurely eat my meal.

When I finished I walked out of the inn and started my tour. I walked at a somewhat slow pace as I took in the sights and internally memorized the layout of the town. _What an intricately designed town…_

A rather large crowd gathered around a certain shop caught my attention. Girls and boys of all ages were clustered around a sign that read: Customer Selection in 5 Minutes!

I asked the excited people around me, "Hey, what is all this? Why is everyone clustered around this shop?"

A young girl beside me turned to face me. "You don't know? Ashley, the legendary seamstress, is doing a specific customer selection! She's been known for making the most fancy and amazing outfits for people she deem worthy of wearing! They even have incredible stat boosts! I heard that the boosts on her most recent masterpiece has a higher defensive buff as good as a full C-Rank armour set, a weight lighter than even leather armour, speed buffs and hiding buffs! It's apparently the one thing that she's been working on since the first day of launch! Her most favored customer will have the chance to buy it!

"Hmmm? Is that so? That masterpiece would be the perfect thing for a floor clearer…" I turned to the girl. "So, how do you get to be one of her customers?"

I waited for a response, but I never got one. She was staring stock-still at me with a revered expression on her face. I wondered why she'd look at me that way… Come to think of it, the excited talk amongst other players had stopped too and they were all looking in my direction. That was when I realized that she wasn't looking at _me_ , but someone _behind_ me!

Before I could turn around and face the person I was pulled into a tight embrace and felt two _things_ smushed up on my face. "Ho-ho-ho! We got a little cutie here! Hey, what's your name, honey?"

"Gah…. air… air!"

She released me from the embrace. "Oh, sorry for that, it's just that you were so cute! Anyways, what's your name?"

Standing in front of me was a woman of about 26 or 27 with a rather large chest and a multicolored outfit that _radiated_ light.

"Uh… Krystor."

She smiled. "Ah, Krystor is it? Well, I'm Ashley! Nice to meet you! I guess I'll let you see my masterpiece and see if you want to buy it. Ok? Come on in!"

She gestured towards the shop that everyone was surrounding, and I felt the heated glares of many envious people on my back.

 _Ah… so she's the fabled Ashley, eh? Well… just my luck. I needed a new set of armour anyways._ I followed Ashley into the shop and closed the door. Inside the shop stood racks upon racks of player-tailored clothing of all colors. Black, purple, silver, gold, blue, green, orange, red, indigo, maroon… almost every color that I knew was on some clothing in this store.

"Come here, Krystor. Let me show you my masterpiece. Since I noticed that you were wearing exactly the same colors as my armour set, I thought that I might as well see if you'd like it."

I walked into the room that Ashley was in, and gaped at the marvelous craftsmanship that hung before my eyes. A sleek and comfortable-looking black-and-violet coat hung on a hanger next to a pair of pants that were black and embroidered with intricate designs in a deep violet color. Next to that hung a pair of gloves that seemed to be reinforced with a luminous obsidian material. Red outlines could be seen faintly decorating the glove. Finally, a pair of black sleek boots with a metallic black metal tip sat on the floor, also embroidered in purple.

 _Are… are my eyes deceiving me?! Am I really seeing what I'm seeing?! This can't be possible! Such perfection in the perfect combination of colors…. Ashley truly is the master seamstress!_

"So… do you like them?" Ashley asked in a teasing voice. She must have seem my reverent expression.

"Of course I like them! They look amazing! How much for all of this?"

"Hmmm…. since it took me nearly three whole weeks to gather all of the required materials and necessities for making this… and the amount of effort that I put into making it… I'd price it at about 300,000 col."

" _300,000 col?!_ " I sighed in defeat. Even now all I had on me was 135,000 Col… "Erm… I can't afford that, sorry Ashley… However, if you'd put that set for me on hold I can pay you 400,000 later on. Every month I can pay you 100,000 Col so in four months everything'll be paid for. Also, I just need the coat for now. Everything else I can pick up later when the final payment has been made. How does that sound?"

Ashley thought about it for a moment, thing smiled, agreeing. "Alright! It's a deal! Oh, and also…" She pointed her finger at me. "In addition to all that allow me to become your personal seamstress! I'll tailor all of your clothes for you, and you pay me a less amount than others! In return, you never go to buy clothes from anywhere else! Is that fine?"

I smiled. "Fine by me, Ashley-san. I can accept that."

She beamed happily at me. "Great! Now take the coat and go! Shoo! I have some more work to get started on! Come back to see me once in a while."

She sent me a friend request. "Also, when the frontlines begin moving up floors, I may relocate my shop to a better location higher up. I'll make sure to message you the new location and you show up there, k?"

I accepted her friend request, received the jacket as an inventory item and equipped it. It immediately appeared over my black shirt and I smiled.

 _So light and comfortable…_

However, I wanted to start wearing it after the first floor, since I felt that I'd be safe even without my armour on.

"Alright! See you later!"

"Bye!"

2 more weeks after I met Asuna, Ashley and Liz for the first time, an announcement in the central part of Tolbana announced that the first floor boss room had been found. Personally, I was not even interested in the details- I gave up on finding the boss room and instead focused on increasing my levels by training against tough mobs. I was Lv. 28 now, and I was sure that the level would go up to Lv. 29 after the boss fight that was sure to take place the next day.

Anyways, according to the announcement the gathering for the boss raid would be at 2 PM this afternoon, and right now it was 1 PM. Oh well…

Suddenly, a lithe figure in a brown cloak approached me. Light brown hair stuck out of the hood in tufts and faint black whiskers could be seen on the cheek. "Message from anonymous sender. Want to hear it?"

I shrugged. "I don't care. Go on, Argo."

I heard a little "hmph," and then she spoke. "Got a guy who wants to buy your sword for 50,000 col. Want it?"

I answered immediately. "Nope. No deal. It's not worth it. It's a B-Ranked sword with 6 upgrades on it already. I'm not selling this for measly 50,000 col."

"Gotcha. I'll tell him that." Argo walked away and soon disappeared into the crowd of people.

I sighed and walked towards the merchant sector of the city to sell the unnecessary mats that I collected and make some extra col before the meeting time at 2.

When the appointed time came rolling around the block, I walked slowly towards the amphitheatre, where the meeting was supposedly being held.

A steady stream of people began filling in seats before people stopped entering. I myself just stood aloof at the top of the amphitheatre, spectating the event and looking at the podium on the ground below.

When the meeting finally started I counted a total of around 40-45 people sitting in the amphitheatre. Most were in clumps or parties of 5 or 6 people, with two exceptions lingering near the tops of the seating area.

A smile came to my lips as I saw Asuna's familiar cloak and a boy who was dressed in brown light armor and a blue shirt. I couldn't see Asuna's equipment, but the boy's sword looked like it was a close match to my own; perhaps a dungeon item or mini-boss drop.

 _He looks like a good player too. Looks like a solo as well._

I turned my attention back to the podium as a man with blue hair, a sword and a shield stepped forwards onto the stone podium.

"Thank you all for coming to my summons. My name is Diabel, and I like to consider it my duty as 'Knight' to-"

He was cut off as various players from the crowd jeered,

"There ain't no class system here!"

"Was that a joke?"

"Is this meeting a joke then too?"

Diabel silenced them all with a wave of his hand. His face turned serious, and we all leaned in to hear what he was about to say. "Yesterday evening my party found the door leading directly to the boss's lair."

Hushed whispers flew to and fro among the crowd of players but I paid it no heed. All I was focused on was what Diabel just said. _The boss has been discovered. It's only a matter of time before the first floor falls to us._

Once everyone had calmed down a bit, Diabel continued. "We will launch our raid on the first floor's boss tomorrow morning. We will complete this raid successfully and show that this dreadful game _can be beaten_. In order for us to do this we will need to form multiple parties-"

An irritatingly loud voice suddenly erupted from the crowd, interrupting Diabel's sentence.

"Hold up!"

A particularly strange looking man was jumping down the stone stairs of the amphitheatre and making his way towards the podium at the bottom. When he reached the podium, he got on it and jabbed his stubby thumb into his chest.

"The name's Kibaou. I've got something to say, and I want everyone here to hear it!"

I snorted with amusement. The man must have been no taller than 5' 2", and he had orange hair spiked up on his head like a cactus bulb. He had a deep scowl on his acne covered face, and I averted my eyes briefly so as to not blind myself by his ugliness.

"There are some of you out there in the crowd who should apologize and atone for those 2,000 players that have died already!"

Off to the side, Diabel quietly asked, "Kibaou-san, are you referring to the ex-beta testers-"

Kibaou cut him off. "Of course I mean those dirty beta testers! Those assholes left us squandering in the Beginning City after that monster Kayaba announced this death game! They set off immediately, taking all of the easy quests and monster spawn points, leaving the rest of us newbies for dead! They never helped us newbies adapt to the game, and as a result ⅕ of our total player population has been lost! Those who are here today should get up here and beg for their lives before giving up all of the items that they've hoarded for all this time! Otherwise, they can't trust us in a party and we definitely can't trust them!"

The players present in the amphitheatre started looking at each other suspiciously and mutters filled the air as tensions began to rise.

I myself was feeling _very_ uncomfortable about the entire situation when a large African-looking man stood up from his spot in the seating area and walked to the podium where Kibaou was standing, gloating in his success.

His smile evaporated from his face, however, when the man stood next to him. The man must have been at least 6 feet tall and had a bald head, giving me the impression of a civilized barbarian. He evidently unnerved Kibaou, who stuttered, "W-who are you?"

The man turned to face the players in the seats, whom had reverted their attention back to the podium.

"My name's Agil. Your claim is that the ex-beta testers never gave us new players a helping hand in adapting to this game, right? That they just left without a trace, and that's why so many players have died so far? Am I right?"

Kibaou nodded fervently. "Yeah, that's exactly it."

Agil pulled something out of his back pocket, and I only needed one glance before I smiled secretly to myself. I would recognize that book anywhere, especially since I had a special connection with it.

"This book was given out for free at any of the shops found in the Beginning City. It's called the 'Beginning Player's Tutorial.' You got one, didn't you?"

Kibaou nodded uncertainly. "Yeah, what about it?"

Agil continued. "This book entailed the specifics of the fighting system in SAO called sword skills. It listed detailed and precise notes about utilizing it to one's best ability, and even gives survival tips on what places are meant for a party, raid, or anything else. This book was written by none other than a beta tester called 'Krystor.' I'm sure that this book was a helpful guide to all players, experienced or not. You agree, don't you?"

Kibaou grumbled unhappily. "Well yeah, the book _was_ kinda helpful…"

"In addition, if you'd look at the cause of death for many of the 2000 players, you'd notice that more than half of those deaths were because of suicide, and the rest were because they went beyond the limits of what they could actually handle and perished. There should be absolutely no blame for the beta testers, who probably also have a high rate of deaths, I guarantee it. Just because you were a beta tester doesn't mean that you're invincible."

Kibaou growled before stomping off of the stage and plunking himself down in a seat on the front row. The atmosphere around the amphitheatre more or less returned to what it was originally.

 _Heh… my book impacted that many people, eh? Oh well…_

Diabel then stepped onto the podium again and continued his speech from before.

"Well… great. Now that that's settled… Listen up everyone! We will launch our raid on the first floor's boss tomorrow morning. We will complete this raid successfully and show that this dreadful game _can be beaten_. In order for us to do this we will need to form multiple parties of players. Challenging a boss without any backup is basically suicide, so form up those parties! Get moving people!"

I yawned. That was definitely not the most charismatic speech that I heard before; even I could've given a better one than that. But Diabel's purpose had already been achieved. He wanted to be the de facto leader of this raid, and now he was.

I particularly didn't care about being in a party; I could survive this raid on my own, but when I saw Asuna and the boy approaching me, I could tell that I'd be forced into joining their party even if I didn't feel like it.

"Hey, Krystor. Long time no see." Asuna said cryptically. I merely nodded my head a bit to show that I acknowledged her. The boy's reaction, however was more of surprise than acknowledgement.

"E-eh? K-krystor?! That's you?!"

I looked at the boy. His tone of voice somehow made me think that he knew me. "Yeah, that's me. And you are…?"

"Kirito! It's me, Kirito!"

Now _that_ got a reaction out of me. "Woah, Kirito… I didn't think that I'd be seeing you in an attire other than black!"

Kirito rolled his eyes at me. "Yeah, yeah, and here you are already in your old clothes scheme. Just can't stay away from black and purple, can you?"

I made a face at him. "It's black and _violet_ , thank you very much. And besides, don't ignore the fact that later on in the game, you're gonna be in a full-black attire. Boots, pants, coat and all. Don't deny it, _Black Swordsman-sama._ "

My voice made it clear that I was taunting him, but Kirito ignored it. "Well… this gives me another chance to prove myself. I'll never lose to you again!"

I smirked. "Oh, really now? What's your current level?"

Kirito thought about it. "Um… I think I just reached Lv. 24 yesterday. Why, what's yours?"

"Lv. 28."

"WHAT?!" Kirito sighed in annoyance and grumbled out, "I lost to you in the beta, and now I lose again to you here? That's just not fair…"

Asuna brought us back out of our bickering as she pulled on my ear. "Ow, ow, ow! That hurts, Asuna!"

She huffed impatiently at me. "Well who's to blame? Anyways, so you and this guy over here know each other?"

Kirito huffed indignantly 'This guy over here' has a name, ya know. It's Kirito. Got it? 'Ki-ri-to'. Anyways, Krystor and I knew each other from the beta version of this game. Always one step ahead of me, too…"

I ignored that last part and turned to Asuna. "So yeah, that's our relationship. Really, we didn't even know each other until the 10th floor had been beaten. When it had, some guy with lots of col hosted a tournament to find out the strongest player in the beta, and Kirito and I ended up facing each other in the final round. Long story short, Kirito lost and he's been bitter about it ever since."

"Iam _not_ bitter about losing! Just you wait! I'll be stronger than you, then _you'll_ be the bitter one chasing after me!"

I rolled my eyes. "Dream on, blacky."

"Hey!"

" _Anyways_ ," Asuna said, "We'll meet back here tomorrow at 8 for the raid. Is that fine with everyone?"

I raised my hand like I was in class and said, "I don't care."

That earned me a smack on the head from Asuna and a scolding that detailed something about not being in school or whatever.

Kirito nodded his assent and the three of us parted ways.

"Krystor?"

I halted when Asuna called my name out hesitantly. I turned around to face her. "Yes, Asuna?"

"Do… do you have any free time right now?"

I scratched my head awkwardly. "Um… no, not as of now, why?"

Asuna looked to the side quickly before speaking in a rushed voice, "IwantsomehelpfightingandyouretheonlyoneItrustrightnow."

I blinked slowly. "Huh?'

She sighed and tried to speak more comprehensively. "I want some help and tips on fighting and you're the only one that I kinda trust right now. Also, that man Agil mentioned that you were the one who wrote the book about the fighting system in this game. Is that true?"

"Yeah, every bit of it. I wanted to help the players, but indirectly, so I wrote this book between the end of beta and beginning of the retail version so that the new players wouldn't have to go through countless efforts of trial-and-error about fighting in this game. Of course, I didn't know that it was a death game, but when I realized that it was, I knew that my book would help some players and prevent them from dying, so just before I left the Beginning City I uploaded the book for free to all players in the merchant sector of town."

Asuna smiled gratefully. "Your book was amazingly thorough, and I learned a great deal about fighting with my rapier after I read that section. Did you use all of the different weapons during the beta?"

"Yeah, but I mostly stuck with the one-handed sword and daggers. That's why those two sections are a bit longer than the rest."

She nodded in understanding. "So… about that help. Will you? Please?"

I shrugged nonchalantly. "Sure, I don't that that much stuff to do except fight anyways. Wanna head to the labyrinth to do that training?"

She nodded mutely and we headed to the labyrinth not far away.

 _Yahh!_ A silver rapier flashed once, twice, thrice before the mob burst into millions of shards. A white rewards screen popped in front of Asuna, and she yelled out in triumph as her level increased from 21 to 22.

I was impressed. For someone who claimed to be a complete noob to video games at all, she was a complete natural at fighting. Her rapier strikes were clean, precise and accurate, and the speed at which she dished out her attacks was amazing.

I quickly averted my attention from her to another mob in front of me, and I quickly dispatched it with a quick Horizontal. The sound of breaking glass resonated throughout the halls of the labyrinth as both of our opponents shattered apart.

I sheathed my daggers to watch Asuna engage more mobs. This time there were three Ruin Kobold Troopers surrounding her. Using what I had taught her earlier during our excursion, she quickly took one out before backflipping onto the second one, stabbing out one of its eyes. She then somersaulted over the head of the third one and charged up a powerful piercing attack, punching her rapier straight through the armour of the mob and reducing it to shards of light. She dodged under the swing of the last remaining Trooper and took it out as quickly as the first and second.

I clapped loudly and the sound reverberated around the corridor. "Amazing, Asuna. If I hadn't met you when you were in dire trouble I would have mistaken you for a veteran of the beta as well. Your movements are fluid and constantly move around to avoid getting hit. Great performance. Let's head back, I'll buy you dinner again tonight to celebrate."

Asuna smiled. "Alright!"

Later, just as the sun was about to set below the horizon, Asuna and I sat at a table that apparently served the 'best food' on the first floor. When our meals arrived, Asuna and I dug into our meals with fervor.

"Ah~ This was a good meal. Although… I'm pretty sure that if you level up the cooking skill high enough, you could make some food that would make the best NPC foods taste like trash. I have an extra skill slot open, and I have Rapier and Acrobatics already. I guess I'll just take that cooking skill.

She opened her menu promptly and messed around with it, probably selecting the Cooking skill in her skill palette.

"Done!" I looked up at Asuna smiling triumphantly. "Oh, by the way, thanks for giving me all this help, Krystor. You've done so much to help me succeed in this game. Thank you very much!"

I shook my head. "No, Asuna. Do not thank me for your progress. Thank yourself. Without your mindset to do well and excel, as hard as I would push you you would never go farther than what you believe your limit would be. That is the trick to staying at the top in this world. Trust in your skills and push yourself to the limit, and the rewards will be great and plentiful. Remember that, alright?" I got up to leave. "I must go now to rest up for the fight tomorrow, and you should too. I'll meet you and Kirito at the 8 at the appointed spot. Goodnight, Asuna."

Asuna nodded and smiled. "Goodnight, Krystor. See you tomorrow."

The next morning I was again woken up by that annoying alarm, and drowsily dressed myself for battle. I ate a quick breakfast before heading over to Liz's to get my gear fully fixed up in preparation for the boss fight. After that I went to the amphitheatre to meet Asuna and Kirito.

"Hey guys! Sorry to keep you waiting!"

Kirito and Asuna turned at my voice. "Oh, hey Krystor. Got a good night's sleep? This fight will be the hardest of the floor." Kirito warned.

I rolled my eyes. "Says the one who died with 26 others during the beta version of this floor, _Blacky-sensei_."

"Hey! You could stop it with those names, ya know. And it was the very first boss everyone had faced. Of course so many died then!"

"Yeah, but at least I wasn't the one who died. In fact, I was the one to get the LA bonus. A nifty coat called the _Coat of Midnight_. It's got hiding bonuses and agility buffs as well. Great coat, if you ask me."

"Well, I wasn't!"

I waved my hand. "Whatever."

"Hey! I take offense to that!"

I smirked. "Yeah, yeah, sure you do, Mr. Second Place."

"I'm not gonna be second for long! You watch out, Krystor!"

"Oh, I'm watchin, alright. I'm watching. But you'll never surpass me, ever. Now hurry up. Everyone's leaving."

Kirito grumbled and followed after me, muttering some things that I couldn't quite discern.

Asuna caught up to me, and I spoke in a low voice to her. "Keep an eye on Kirito for me. I saw how he fought in the beta, and it's too reckless. If he ever needs help, go to him immediately, even if it means leaving me alone to handle the boss. Understood?"

She nodded mutely. "Understood."

I nodded back, and felt a weight lift off of my shoulders. We fell back to where Kirito was walking. "Remember the formation, guys. We're going to face off against the boss's guards the Sentinels before taking on the boss itself. Also, while fighting, Kirito will first block the mob's attack, Asuna will follow up with a quick attack and I'll finish it off before moving onto the next one. Is everyone clear?"

Both of them nodded. "Alright then. We are officially ready for battle. Brace yourselves, and try your hardest to not die. Thanks."

Kirito rolled his eyes. "What a charismatic speech right there. For a minute I thought you were Diabel."

I glared at Kirito. "Wow, thanks Kirito."

He shrugged. "No probl-"

I interrupted his sarcastic remark with an outstretched arm. "We're here guys. Prepare yourselves."

In front of us loomed the massive double doors of the boss room, intricately carved with scenes of death and destruction.

"Happy place…" Kirito muttered.

Before I could make a witty comeback Diabel spoke to us one last time before entering the boss room.

"Players! Do not doubt your abilities during this fight! Do the best you can and no one will die in this raid! Let's go!"

Everyone roared in agreement and rushed through the massive doors that Diabel pushed open. As I ran with the raid group one last thought crossed my mind before the battle adrenaline entered my veins.

 _Well… Once we finish off this boss it'll be the first step out of a hundred. Little steps, yes, but we will clear this damn castle sooner or later. I'll win this game. For both me and the other players trapped in here._

As we rushed into the room, fluorescent lights lit up the interior of the room, revealing the boss, Illfang the Kobold Lord. Beside him were four guards called the Ruin Kobold Sentinels. As far as I could tell the only difference between the sentinels and the troopers was that the sentinels had higher levels and stronger attacks. Other than that, they were easy fry. Illfang, however, was a different story. Judging from the bosses from the beta, he would change his attack patterns and weapon choice once he lost the first out of the two that he had.

"Commence attack!" Diabel yelled. "A, B and C teams, engage the Kobold Lord! D, E and F teams fend off the guards!"

"Understood!"

My team and I quickly veered off towards the right to engage two of the four sentinels, leaving the other two groups with the other two sentinels.

 _Yahh!_ As with accordance to our plan, Kirito blocked the incoming attacks of the sentinels with his sword, and Asuna leapt in to do heavy damage to both mobs. When she got out of the way I quickly activated a new skill that I recently got, Horizontal Square. A total of four consecutive hits landed squarely on both sentinels, reducing them to shards of fragmented light in an instant.

 _Nooooo!_

A high-pitched scream filled with rage and despair pierced through the massive room near us as the sound of shattering glass filled my ears. I quickly turned towards the source, and paled when I saw the remains of a killed player disappear without a trace. The 3 other party members were crouched on the ground, quivering in fear before the victorious Ruin Kobold Sentinel with its massive mace in hand.

A burst of rage filled my veins as I hurtled towards the sentinel at a breakneck speed. Just as the sentinel's mace was about to hit the group of three, I intercepted it with my two daggers crossed over each other. My health dipped 2% as the mace pressed against my daggers.

With a roar, I pushed back with all my strength and managed to push the mace away from me before beheading the sentinel with two Horizontals at the neck. With a cry of utter despair it shattered apart.

I leaned down and checked to make sure that all three of the players on the ground were alright. Their HP was in the yellow zone, so they weren't in any real danger, but I advised them to teleport out of the fight anyways, since they didn't seem to be fit enough to continue fighting. It must have been a great shock to see someone die in front of them like that.

 _ARGGGG!_ This time the cry was from the boss, the Kobold Lord. I watched iys first HP bar disappear, and as it stumbled around in pain it dropped its buckler and sword.

"Everyone pull back! I've got this!"

Diabel ran forwards with his sword shining with an intense light. I stared perplexed as he ran past me.

 _That… that wasn't the plan though… we were supposed to surround it and slowly whittle down its HP… so why are yo-_

I realized what he was attempting to do. "No! Diabel! You can't get it like that! Even if you try your best, it still has a full bar left!"

Diabel, however, ignored me and continued charging at Illfang. I was worried for him, but when I saw the new weapon that the boss pulled out, I froze.

 _That's not the beta version of Illfang's new weapon! That's a No-dachi, not a Talwar!_

Right as that thought crossed my mind Illfang launched its attack on Diabel. It leapt up in the air and bounced off the various pillars around the room like a pinball before landing on Diabel and slashing him cleanly on the chest.

A sharp cry of surprise erupted from Diabel's mouth as his HP dropped drastically from high green to yellow in an instant. When the boss followed up his initial attack with two more powerful slashes, I knew that he was a goner.

Still, I ran towards the spot where he had collapsed and handed him a health potion. As I eyed the raid leader, small tears formed at the corner of my eyes.

"Why… why did you have to go in like that? You knew the risks! You knew them! So why?!"

Diabel cringed slightly at my voice. "Y-you were a beta tester too, weren't you? You knew what I was going for."

I nodded sadly. "You were going in for the last attack bonus, weren't you?" He smiled slightly and nodded.

"Why, though?!"

"You know the answer to that as well. To gain powerful items and survive. You're the same way too, aren't you?"

I looked at Diabel's HP bar. It was gone. My eyes widened as Diabel's form began to shimmer.

"Please, I ask of you… beat this boss, and see to it that as many people as possible escape this game. Please."

And he was gone.

I fought back the tears that threatened to spill from my face, and stood up emotionlessly. I slowly turned to face the boss which was currently hacking away at other players. The sounds of shattering glass filled my ears once again as player after player fell to the boss's relentless attacks.

I started walking towards the boss before breaking into a full-out sprint. At the corner of my eyes I saw Kirito and Asuna running alongside me.

They smiled when I turned to look at them. "We'll do this together, then. Follow the same plan as before."

They nodded and we rushed forwards towards the boss. Right before we reached him, Illfang noticed us and swung his massive sword at us.

Kirito blocked the sword and got smashed out of the way, but it left the boss open to Asuna and I.

We both launched our attacks at its torso and jumped away quickly when our cooldown recovery time was over.

We ran towards Illfang again in the same formation. Illfang must have learned, however, because when he swung his sword at Kirito, it used that same three-hit combo technique that killed Diabel on us.

Kirito's HP was knocked down to a dangerous amount of 45%, but Asuna just got her cloak destroyed, revealing her true form underneath. I got hit too, but my attention was on Asuna at the moment, so I barely registered the fact that I got hit as I caught sight of Asuna's true image.

 _She's like a goddess…_

Locks of chestnut hair flitted around her face as she fell, and waist-length hair floated around her slim body, a red-and-white shirt rippling in the wind. I was brought back to reality when my faced smashed into the ground, bringing my HP down a bit more.

 _Shit…_ I eyed my HP, which was currently at around 55%. I quickly downed a health potion and backed up alongside Kirito and Asuna, whom had also downed their own health potions.

I glanced up as Illfang roared and brought its sword down on us, only to be stopped by Agil's axe.

He glanced over his shoulder at us as he struggled to keep Illfang at bay. 'We'll hold off the boss until the three of you recover!"

"Thanks!"

The three of us waited until our HP was back to full 100%, and charged back into the fight, and not too soon either.

Right as my HP reached full, the boss let out an earth-shaking roar and leapt up into the air, charging a powerful sword skill as it fell.

 _Oh no you don't!_ I shouted loudly and shot forwards towards the falling boss. Right as the boss was about to slash at the players below with its No-dachi, I intercepted it in midair. The boss's sword skill was canceled and the two of us crashed onto the ground hard. My HP dropped 2% from the impact.

Then, Kirito and Asuna were at my side and I turned to nod at them. "We'll finish this together, alright? Same plan as before, just be more careful this time." The two of them nodded grimly.

With a roar of defiance, an unknown energy rushed through our bodies as we charged at the boss in front of us. Illfang swung his sword but Kirito countered it, allowing Asuna and I the ability to deal crippling attacks at the massive monster. When I finished my four-part attack I noticed that the boss's health was in the red.

"Kirito! I'll give you a break this time and let you have the LA! Go finish him for us!"

Kirito looked stunned at what I was saying, but I faintly had an idea of how my status was going to be tainted after the boss fight was over. I had literally proclaimed myself a beta tester in front of everyone in the room, and I knew that the one group of people that many players hated were the beta testers.

When I shook myself out of my dark thoughts a loud cheering could be heard echoing throughout the crowd. Shouts of congratulations to Kirito for his victory could be heard, and I smiled to myself slightly. _Good job, Kirito. Keep at it, and perhaps you may be the one to lead us all out of here…_

Suddenly a hand pushed me roughly to the ground.

"You were a _beta tester_ , weren't you?!" I slowly looked up and saw Kibaou's face twisted with rage.

 _Just as I thought…_

The cheering died down and Kibaou growled at me. "You let Diabel die! You knew all of the boss's attack patterns and STILL let Diabel go running to his death! You caused it! YOU!"

I just sat through Kibaou's raging rant. Kirito and Asuna came running over. "What do you mean, he let Diabel die? You all saw Diabel run in on his own accord! No one could have sto-"

"Enough."

I interrupted Kirito's sentence. As much as I hated to do this, I needed for all of the hate to not spread to all of the beta testers, but onto me. I could survive this hatred and this world, but no other tester could. Not even Kirito. They'd be grinded down in seconds. But I was not like the rest I could survive and win this game.

I started laughing maniacally, and got up from my previous sitting position on the ground. "Beta tester, you say?" My voice was dripped with venom and malice. "True, I was a beta tester, yes. But I was not like those newbies who didn't even know how to level up! You all here are much , much better than them!" My voice rose to a shout before quieting down again. "But I was different. Among all of the 1,000 testers in the beta, I was the top player amongst them. I was THE STRONGEST IN THE GAME! I have more knowledge on this game than any info broker, and the survival tips to stay alive in this living hell."

Kibaou was momentarily shocked silent. "Wha-what?! Then you're worse than a beta tester! You're a cheater! You're a… you're a beater!"

I smiled darkly. "Beater, eh? I like it!"

Everyone in the room gasped in shock and surprise. "Yes… I'm a beater. Remember that from now on, fools. I am no ordinary beta tester. I AM A BEATER!"

I equipped on my special coat that I got from Ashley and smiled with malice. The coat floated around my crouched body as the coat materialized onto me, creating a dramatic waving motion. My voice lowered to a whisper.

"Try to keep up, my fellow players!"

I laughed again and started up the stairs leading up to the 2nd floor.

"Wait!"

I paused for a moment as Asuna and Kirito came running up to me.

"Krystor, don't do this man!"

I smiled at Kirito. "Kirito, you were a great friend during the beta. Lead those people down there and the rest of the clearers through the floors. You too, Asuna. Both of you have great potential and power. I can feel it. If either of you find a guild trustworthy enough, then join them. There's only so much that a soloer can do."

"W-what about you, then?" Asuna's voice quivered a bit.

I smiled slightly. "Kirito should be able to understand my current situation. I now have the hatred of some of the most powerful players currently in Aincrad. I'll just live life like I have before- alone. Kirito, Asuna," I Iooked at both of them in the eye. "It was nice meeting both of you. Hopefully as the game progresses we will see each other more often. I will be there at all of the boss fights, all you need to do is message me the time and place. I'll find my way there and participate then leave. You both have me on your friends list. If you need help on anything at any time message me and I'll be there to help you. Other than that…"

I paused before continuing my way up the stone steps. "Farewell."


	3. Tragedy and a Surprise

Chapter 3

 _As soon as the first floor was cleared, hope of actually beating the game came to many people and the ranks of the frontline swelled from a meager force of 30-40 players to 500-600 players. At one point of time before the 25th floor the frontline force had been well over 1000 players, but when the 25th floor boss wiped out an entire squad of some of the Army's best players, they retreated back to the first floor and began managing their base of operations in the Blackiron Castle in the Beginning City. After the Army made their hasty retreat from the frontlines, the number of frontliners dwindled down to a range of 500-600 players left on the battlefield._

 _True to my word to Kirito and Asuna, I appeared at every boss battle and when it ended, disappeared before many others could notice me. I lived a solitary life and leveled up continuously by completing quests meant for large parties, soloing dungeons never explored before, and trained for hours on end in the floor labyrinths. Ever since the 8th floor, I made sure that my player level was at least 20 levels above the current floor number. I trained and trained, day and night nonstop until I couldn't hold back my fatigue any longer. Then I'd go back to the inn that I rented and sleep until I felt like my body was replenished with energy again._

 _Due to my constant mysteriousness, secrecy and power, rumours had begun to spread throughout the player base. According to Ashley, my old title 'Beater' had been replaced with 'Fallen Angel Lucifer' due to my black-and-violet color scheme, incredible power, and 'dark' past in the game. The terms that they used to describe me were 'fast', 'powerful', 'overpowered', 'insane', and 'Demon'._

 _Periodically I'd stop by Liz's place or Ashley's place to get weapons repaired or better, new clothing to wear. Otherwise, I was cut off from the rest of the world. Currently the only things that mattered to me were training, fighting, and surviving. The current frontline floor was the 28th floor._

Bright sunlight filtered through the glass window of my room as the sun rose into the sky, indicating the start of a new day. A little chiming sound went off as a little notification told me of a new message.

Slightly curious, I opened up the message and read its contents.

Hey Krystor!

Yeah, so anyways, you know how you advised me to join a guild and stuff? See, actually I was invited to join a guild called 'Knights of the Blood Oath' led by a man named Heathcliff a month ago, and I'm enjoying it a lot! The Commander (Heathcliff) just asked me to be his second-in-command! Umm… but I'm not sure if I want to just yet… could we meet up at that restaurant and talk a bit?

Thanks!

~Asuna

I sighed. Lately Asuna had been pestering me about lots of random stuff lately. Like two weeks ago she messaged me asking if I could sample some of the dishes that she had been crafting together. Granted, since her cooking skill wasn't superb, her dishes weren't all that great, but they were certainly better than the NPC stuff sold in regular restaurants and vendors. In order to get high quality meals from NPCs I had to go to the most expensive and fancy NPC-run restaurants that cost almost 5,000 col a meal. At least those meals tasted good.

Anyways, I quickly swiped open my inventory to see my current stats- I hadn't checked them in quite a while now.

Krystor: Lv. 52 HP: 51,500 Agility: 68 Strength: 44

Skills: One-handed sword, Auto-Battle Regen, Daggers, Acrobatics, . Searching, Hiding Col: 1,431,560

I sighed offhandedly and closed my player menu. I quickly changed from my bed clothes into the casual clothes that Ashley had insisted on giving me as a 'present'.

When they materialized onto my virtual body, I marveled at its beauty. Just like any other piece of cloth that she made, this outfit consisted of very high-quality work. It was a black shirt with thin violet strips going down the sides, followed by a casual jacket that had glittery red-and-violet outlines on its sleeves. A pair of black pants with purple stripes going down that was topped off by a pair of black combat boots that apparently also gave speed buffs. Huh. Interesting.

With my attire on and my things all checked, I headed out of my inn room on the 29th floor and went to the fanciest restaurant. Almost no-one went there except for those who were extremely powerful frontliners and had enough col to waste for 5,000 col per meal.

When I got to the restaurant I saw Asuna waiting outside with a worried expression on her face. It was then that I decided that I would give her a little scare before formally greeting her. I crept up on her when she was looking in the opposite direction, got next to her ear, and whispered, "Thought I wouldn't come?"

Which, of course, resulted in an extremely flustered Asuna, a slap across my face, and a lot of attention. When I recovered from the sudden numbness of the slap, I saw a hand in front of me. I looked and saw a slightly amused Asuna with an extended hand. I grabbed it and pulled myself up, well… I _tried_ to. What really happened was that my strength parameter was apparently stronger than hers, so instead of her pulling me up, I ended pulling her onto me, which resulted in us both falling onto the floor in an awkward position _and_ garnering even _more_ attention from passersby.

Asuna was blushing profusely at the awkward position that we were in, and I was desperately trying to free myself from this tangle of limbs, hair and bodies. By the time we untangled ourselves from each other, a large crowd had formed. They had jealous faces and were looking threateningly at me.

A man wearing a white-and-red uniform came up to me. He glared menacingly at me and asked, "Who the hell do you think you are, doing such scurrilous activities with our beloved vice-commander?"

I blinked once. "Huh? Oh… so you're also from that guild, Knights of the Blood Oath? Interesting."

His face turned to rage. "Watch your own mouth, boy, before you regret it."

Now the flames of anger began to spark in me. But unlike others, my flames are cold. Freezing. My voice began to show that iciness.

"Make me regret _what_? You can't do anything about what I do, and you've got no strength to make me bend to your will. Now, if you've got good sense, bug off. I have business to attend to." My span of patience was clearly almost over.

The response I got was in the form of a duel request. I coldly gazed at his fiery glare and pressed the accept button. I then chose the mode: Half Health.

A hand landed on my shoulder gently and I turned to see Asuna with a worried expression. I smiled at her and whispered, "Don't worry, I won't hurt him much. Just shake him up a little. We'll go talk about what you wanted to talk about later after this, ok? Just stand over there and watch this match. It'll be over soon."

She nodded timidly and sat down on the steps of the restaurant to watch.

Meanwhile I equipped my full combat regalia, which was an enhanced version of my outfit for the first 25 floors from Ashley, my two fully upgraded A-Rank daggers and fully upgraded B-Rank sword.

A few gasps escaped from the crowd, and even my opponent visibly paled when he realized who I truly was.

KRYSTOR VS. MAX

"It's the Demon… I heard that he conquered party-sized dungeons single-handly…"

"No way… that's insane!"

"I know, but look at that equipment! It's gotta be the best out there right now!"

"Oh, man. Max's gonna get his butt handed to him on a platter…"

"But he's really strong! He's one of the strongest players in the guild!"

"Yeah, but on the other hand…"

I shut out all external noises around me and quickly focused my mind and analyzed my opponent.

 _He's a one-handed sword wielder, so he'll either strike at me fast or strike at me with power. His gear is good, but not as good as mine. I'd judge his sword to be almost on par with my own, but with my daggers…"_

I was brought out of my thoughts as the countdown timer ticked down to 0.

Begin!

When the fight began the man, Max, came running at me and put his sword in a position to activate the sword skill Sonic Leap. It was a good starting move, as it decreased the distance between the opponent and the attacker in an instant. However, due to the fact that I knew that he was going to activate that skill, I leapt back a great distance and waited to him to execute his attack.

 _There!_

The minute Max attacked and missed, I activated the dagger skill Acupuncture on both daggers. The light glowed in my weapons as I delivered 14 precise and powerful hits on Max's temporarily stunned avatar.

The sounding of a bell rang out, signifying me as the winner and the time it took me to beat him: 10 seconds.

Loud cheering for me exploded from the crowd as I waved once and dragged a stunned Asuna into the restaurant with me. When Asuna finally came to her senses she wiggled herself out of my grasp and demanded, "How did you beat a powerful frontliner in a mere 10 seconds?!"

I shrugged my shoulders and said, "I didn't expect it to be that quick either. I was expecting a little more challenge than that petty fight. I mean, I don't even think it qualifies as a fight in my book, he was way too weak."

Asuna huffed in annoyance. "You do realize that you just beat the 4th best K.O.B. player in 10 seconds, right? A Lv. 38 player?"

I laughed. "No wonder he was so weak. Asuna, my level right now is 52. I think beating a Lv. 38 player is a piece of cake.

"And when exactly did you reach that insanely high level?!" Her voice was laced with surprise and doubt.

I scratched the back of my head. "Eh… I think it was because I trained once in the highest levels of the 25th floor labyrinth for 3 straight days without stopping for more than 2 hours at a ti-"

 _SLAP_

I groaned and clutched one side of my face pitifully. "That hurt, Asuna!"

She huffed and crossed her arms together. "It's your fault for telling me such worrying things! You could have died there! Do you realize that?!"

I nodded frantically and tried to get her accusing glare off of me. "A-ah, ok Asuna! I get it! I won't do anything like that again!"

She frowned and gave me a sideways glance. "Promise?"

I smiled genuinely and said, "I promise."

Then she smiled and said, "Oh! Yes, the thing I wanted to talk to you about! How much do you know about Heathcliff, and how much do you trust him?"

I thought about it. The man had appeared on the 5th floor, saving me from a near-death experience by blocking the boss's attack with his massive crucifix shield. Ever since then he had been almost as much as a help to the frontlines as I was; he was a great tank, and I was the best DPS. It was thanks to the two of us that the 25th floor boss was defeated at all. However, he never quite explained who he was and how he had gotten so powerful even without being on the frontlines for the first few floors. Nevertheless, I trusted the man enough that I'd allow Asuna to stay in his new guild and become its second-in-command.

I grinned. "I think you'd be great as Heathcliff's second-in-command. Next to me, you're a really good DPS, and you're almost as quick as I am, so I think you'd be fine. I trust Heathcliff enough to guarantee your safety and health in his guild. I'm sure it will become the best in the game in no time."

Asuna laughed and said, "Yeah, that's what I was thinking too; I just wanted to double check to see if it was alright with you as well."

I frowned. "Asuna, you know that you don't need my approval for whatever you do." Asuna mirrored my frown. "But you're the strongest player in Aincrad! Who else should I ask for advice?"

"Kirito" I replied without hesitation. "He's almost as good a player as me, and he's a reliable player—more so than I am."

Asuna pouted. "Yeah, I know that, but still…"

I glanced at Asuna and noticed a slight glimmer in her eyes. "You ok, Asuna?" She nodded and tried to cover up her true thoughts with a smile, but I knew that it was fake.

I looked worriedly at her. "Asuna, tell me what's wrong. You're almost never like this. Let me help."

Asuna sighed. "I-it's Kirito. Two days ago he contacted me, saying that he found himself a guild and that he was going to miss the floor 27 boss fight because of something."

I nodded—I had noticed that Kirito was missing from the fight, which was something that I didn't understand. Other than myself, Kirito one of the strongest DPS players that we had, if not the second strongest. The fact that he decided to skip out on a boss was huge, and it had me worrying too.

"So that's it? You're worried about him because he missed that boss? It shouldn't be that big of a deal. I'm sure that he'll be there for the 28th floor boss."

Asuna shook her head. "No, that's not the problem. It's the guild that he joined. They're a really low level guild made of only one party. Their averages, excluding Kirito, are around the mid 20's. And their base is on the 10th floor."

My eyes widened slightly at that. "W-what?! Are you serious Asuna? You know how much Kirito doesn't like to interact with others, let alone those of lower levels than him!"

Suddenly, a _ping_ sound went off, indicating a new message. It was from Kirito. I quickly swiped open my messages tab and read the message. When I was done my eyes widened and I shot out of my chair, yelling at Asuna that I had business to take care of and to reschedule a later time to hang out. I quickly payed the tab and rushed out the door. I pulled out a teleport crystal and shouted, "Teleport! Wyvern!"

The minute I appeared in the city on the 27th floor, I ran in the direction of the labyrinth. While I ran I mentally replayed what I read in the letter.

 _Krystor,_

Krystor, I have a problem. I believe you heard from Asuna one way or another that I joined a guild. Anyways, they're about to tackle the floor 27 labyrinth and I don't think they're ready for it yet! Could you please come and provide backup for us? We're heading out now, please hurry!

I cursed mentally. What the heck had Kirito gotten himself into now?! I pushed my sprint skill to its limits, racing through the fields that lay between the labyrinth and the city. By the time I finally reached the area that marked the beginning of the labyrinth, I didn't see Kirito or his guild anywhere. Then, with my tracking skill, I picked up a set of footprints, probably Kirito and the guild. I ran in, following the footprints and tearing through any opponents that foolishly tried to obstruct my path.

Finally, I heard a voice, then a shout. A door somewhere in front of me opened, and then…

"No! Stop! Get out of there!"

My blood froze—that was Kirito's voice, no doubt. I dashed once more, and a door appeared in my vision. I saw a flash of black—Kirito. I saw the door about to close, so I slid and managed to slide through just as the door slammed shut.

When I had my vision back again, I saw a shocked group of people around me and Kirito. Judging from the group's gear, I could tell that they were all beginners at fighting and had no right to be fighting so close to the frontlines.

Then my gaze fell on Kirito. He was still dressed in all black, with a sword drawn and a worried/relieved expression on his face.

"Thank heavens you made it, Krystor! I thought you wouldn't have made it!" Suddenly, the room turned red and alarms started blaring. Panicking, Kirito's party members glanced around the room wearily. I drew out my two daggers, seeing as they dealt more damage than my sword.

As if at once, rock elemental monsters and goblins with pickaxes began appearing out of the walls of the room, swarming us. I narrowed my eyes and cursed. There had to have been at least 40 or 50 mobs now, and more just kept coming.

Without a second thought I lunged into the throngs of the monsters and did what I did best—fight like a demon. In a mere minute or two, my entire sector was clear. Unfortunately, that also let me see the death of one of Kirito's guildmates. He tried to use the teleport crystal, but when it didn't work, he panicked and got cut down.

Then, as if a chain reaction had been set off, each of the guild members got cut down as well, one by one. It was when the last member, a girl of about 14, got sliced in the back and died that Kirito went berserk and fought at a level that signified complete and total rage. I tore my gaze off of him as monsters started surrounding me again. I snarled—they would pay dearly for this. I screamed and threw myself at the monsters, tearing them apart in batches.

At the end, my health was at 60% and Kirito was at 24%. I looked at him worriedly. Ever since the monsters had been destroyed Kirito was very quiet. He got up silently and moved toward the door. I hurried up to him and followed him out the door.

By the time we reached the city, both his and my health regenerated back to full, though Kirito payed it no mind. He walked up to the teleporter and muttered, "Teleport, Town of Beginnings."

I sighed. Kirito sounded so broken right now, and I had to stick around him to make sure he didn't do anything rash. So when he teleported away I also stepped up and said the same thing. In a flash, I appeared in the teleport gate in front of the plaza that I was in on the day of first launch. I spotted Kirito off to the left, walking towards the western area of the city.

I sucked in a breath. That was where many people had once jumped off to commit suicide—I couldn't let that happen to Kirito!

I followed him from a distance, until I saw him meet up with another player, perhaps another member of his now-disseminated guild. I heard them speak a few sentences, saw the other player step back in shock, speak a few words, and jump off the edge.

Kirito merely said nothing, acknowledged nothing, and teleported away. Though I was too far away to hear the floor, I knew what he was planning, and it was literal suicide.

I pulled out another teleport crystal and shouted, "Teleport! Mordred!"

The minute I appeared on the 28th floor I looked around frantically. Nothing. No sight of Kirito. I grumbled and ran in the direction of the 28th floor labyrinth, activating my sprint skill. When I reached the labyrinth, I raced inside, not surprised to find the corridors completely devoid of any mobs—Kirito was indeed here, and recently too.

When I finally heard sounds of combat, I stumbled across a strange scene. Kirito was tearing into a group of 20 mobs and took them out quickly. He then strode away, into the darkness. I heard the creaking of a door, and my eyes widened. _I knew it! He's going to try to solo the floor boss!_

I heard the roars of the boss, and sprinted towards it. When I emerged on the scene, I saw Kirito face off against a humanoid boss; a very similar-looking King Arthur. I was relieved when I saw the boss's low health. With a combo attacks from me, that boss could be defeated very quickly. I almost doubted that it was really a boss until I saw it dodge a swing from Kirito and in turn slashed Kirito across the chest. I gasped when I saw his HP plummet from full down to the half-way mark.

No way… I muttered. Kirito was a very high level, probably only 5 or 6 below me. For such a player like him to get knocked down to half from just one slash… I knew that this boss was going to be much tougher than I thought.

I immediately jumped into battle, pulling out both of my daggers. I charged at the boss, whom had at this point noticed me and was running at me. I blocked the boss's powerful blow, but staggered under it. _Exactly how much power does this guy have?!"_ I gritted my teeth and slashed at it with a combo, damaging it down to the red zone.

At that exact moment, the boss changed. Now, instead of a look-alike Arthur, there was a look-alike Mordred. Judging from past knowledge about the King Arthur stories, I knew Mordred was definitely more powerful than Arthur, even if they both died at the end of the story.

Mordred took out his new blade, a wicked gleaming saber 3 feet long. He raised the sword to skewer me until…

 _Shling!_

Mordred's sword arm was sliced off and shattered, leaving the boss seemingly defenseless. Behind Mordred, I could see Kirito's outline moving in for another strike.

Suddenly, another sword materialized in the boss's other arm and Mordred swung around, slashing Kirito across the chest and sent him flying back. I growled lowly. Even if I couldn't see his HP bar, I knew that he wouldn't be able to survive another direct hit like that.

I looked at the boss's HP bar. _Still 20% left?! I need at least 2 combo hits with my daggers to kill it off!_

I then looked at my own HP bar. The yellow that filled my HP bar indicated that I still had about half health left.

I gritted my teeth. I had no guarantee of surviving, but it was to save Kirito, I would be willing to take the risk!

With a massive roar, I leapt up and swung my daggers at the boss, connecting for a brief moment before it knocked me away and smashed me into a wall. With a strangled gasp, I briefly watched as one of my daggers broke, turning into brilliant flashes of light before fading away, forever.

I snarled savagely at the boss. _He's just a program! JUST A PROGRAM! HOW COULD IT BEAT ME?!_ It was then that I decided that I would defeat the system that bound me here, bound me to these rules of death and fear. I would oppose the very system in which I was trapped in.

I still had one dagger left and had my sword on my back. Slowly, I got up and watched Kirito fight against the boss once again. My right hand reached for the sword on my back, and my left clutched the dagger tightly. Suddenly, my thoughts became clear. I would fight the system, and WIN!

Some sort of dialogue box appeared in front of me at the time, but I swiped it away without paying it much mind. The only thing on my mind right now was to kill that boss and later on, Kayaba Akihiko himself, the creator of this death trap.

With a roar much fiercer and louder than the one previous, I leapt forwards to engage the boss one last time. The boss saw me coming, however, and knocked Kirito away before turning to face me. I growled savagely and launched myself at the boss. The last thing that I remembered before fading into darkness was my blades lighting up with the color of a sword skill.

 _That's strange…_

And my mind faded away, with Kirito frantically calling my name over and over.


	4. A Duel and New Companions

**Hey guys, I'm back! Sorry for the wait, school sucks and it sucks time from my busy schedule. Anyways, to answer a few questions:**

 **No, Krystor will not receive the Dual Wielding skill, Kirito will still be the one to receive it. However, I will be giving Krystor two new unique skills, so be excited!**

 **Regarding Krystor's spam of sword skills, this will go into one of the unique skills I have planned to give to him. For now, whenever Krystor attacks, he's using a swordskill. I've reduced the cooldown time quite a bit, example Horizontal will have almost no cooldown so he can constantly use it while other stronger skills will have a longer cooldown period.**

 **I'll tell you guys Krystor's lv at the beginning of each chapter just so you can know and tell me if I'm overpowering him a bit too much.**

 **Note: I will try to keep my chapters at least 4,000 words long and update once a week, but if I get a good turnout of reviews I may bump it up to 5,000-6,000 words minimum per chapter. Review, review, review!**

 **Have fun reading!**

 **Chapter 4**

 _Krystor: Lv. 54_

Sometime later, I groggily opened my eyes and took in my surroundings. It was dark, and I was apparently laying on a bed or something. As my eyes scanned the room inquisitively, I noticed that I was a room of some sort. Whatever type of room it was, I had no idea. I made a mental note to myself to add NightVision as a skill once I had the space to allocate it.

Suddenly, the lights came on and I instinctively closed my eyes shut before slowly opening them up again. Voices resonated in my head and I groaned, rolling on my side.

"…rystor? Krystor? You there?"

The ringing and voices finally stopped, allowing me to focus on reality. Kirito and Asuna were looking at me with mirroring worried expressions. I smiled weakly at them and said, "Hey guys. What's up?"

The moment the words came out of my mouth, I was tackled off of the bed and onto the ground by Asuna. She hugged me and whispered that she was so glad that I was alright.

I smiled and replied, "You know, I never thought of you to be the hugging type."

Asuna's face turned red instantly and slapped me across the face, leaving a bright red mark on my face. She flushed bright red with total embarrassment.

"Don't say things like that, idiot!" I laughed and got off of the floor, helping Asuna to her feet as well.

"Ok, I'm up now. So what do you guys want from me?" Kirito and Asuna looked at me, then looked at each other, before looking at me again. Asuna frowned.

"Can't we just drop by to visit a friend? Also, we're in Kirito's room right now. Ever since you collapsed in that boss room, you were in a coma-like state for days! Kirito's been watching over you ever since then."

It took me a while to process what I just heard, until I shouted, "WHAT?! I was out for DAYS?!" I groaned into my hand. "Oh, man! I missed so many days of grinding that I'll never be able to get back onto the pace that I was on before! So many levels that I could have gotten!"

As I shook my head sullenly Kirito smiled faintly and said in a quiet voice, "You got most of the exp from that floor boss, so it should make up for the exp that you could've gotten in these past days." He looked sheepishly down at his shoes. "And I guess I should thank you for going in with me to face off the boss; without you there I surely would've been killed. I guess I just wasn't thinking straight when I trekked to the boss's lair."

I could still hear the pain that lingered in his voice; the pain that showed how much the death of his old guild truly affected him. "Kirito…"

He nodded his head. "Yeah, I'm slowly recovering from the shock of the Moonlit Cats' deaths, but Asuna made me promise that I'd live on to preserve their memories in the future, be it a book or memorial book or something. She's helped me get on in the past few days."

Asuna noticed the look on Kirito's face and took his hand in both of hers. "Yes, it's been hard. But it's going to be alright." She turned to face me. "The other reason why I'm here is to notify you that a group of 5 strong players just recently made an announcement to all of the clearers."

My eyebrows rose at this. "Define 'strong'."

Asuna continued. "These players constantly attended all of the boss fights, just like you. In addition, they never conversed with anyone or made themselves known… until 4 days ago, when you and Kirito cleared the 28th floor."

She had my attention now. Usually, I wouldn't care about any random player, but if they were strong enough to fight and survive at every boss encounter and be isolated from the rest of the gaming population, they had to be very skilled. I waved my hand at Asuna. "Go on."

She continued. "Four days ago, after the announcement of the 28th floor being cleared mysteriously, the group of 5 introduced themselves on the 29th floor. They called themselves 'The Wreaths', and they announced to all of the clearers and guilds that any person or guild that managed to defeat them in a 5 v. 5 duel would obtain their cooperation in any event or raid or fight."

My interest peaked. "And?"

"Naturally, many tried. Guilds of all prestige and strength tried to beat them. Even Kirito grudgingly joined the KoB team of 5 that fought, although we lost. It was me, Kirito, Max, Gregory and Alten. We gave them a run for their money in the beginning, but we lost in the end, and they only lost 3 people."

I was surprised. The group of 5 had the strength to overpower the elites of the currently most powerful guild in the game? Now _that_ was impressive. I smirked and rubbed my hands together excitedly. "Sooo…" I drawled out. "Are they still accepting challenges?"

My two friends saw the glint in my violet eyes and shivered. "Yeah, they are, although you'll be hard-pressed to find another guild that hasn't yet faced off with them and lost."

I smiled and said in a low voice, "I don't care for those other guilds, Asuna. I'm going to face them all in battle, 5 v 1, and win. I don't care what it takes, but if I can get their cooperation, even a little, that means I'll be in league with some of the most powerful players in the game!"

Kirito looked at me nervously. "Um… Krystor? You sure about this buddy? Even I had a hard time against their strongest, though the other 4 were pretty easy for me. The only reason why I lost was because the leader kept on distracting me from the others, and once the other 4 KoB members got knocked out of the duel they all ganged up on me. I'm not sur-"

I cut him off. "Don't worry about me; just tell me where they're having the challenges. I want to see them for myself before I judge them."

Kirito sighed. "Very well. They are located near the teleport gate on the 29th floor. Just shout that you want a challenge and they'll come to you."

I nodded and said, "Ok, got it." I turned to leave before a thought hit me. "You guys wanna come see me fight them?"

Kirito and Asuna looked at each other before shrugging their shoulders and agreeing, albeit reluctantly.

"Well, we'll come see you, but don't be surprised to get your ass handed to you on a platter. Those guys are really something." Kirito said.

I heeded Kirito's words, but strengthened my resolve nonetheless. I strode out the door and headed right for the teleport gate. When I reached the gate I looked back to make sure Kirito and Asuna were following me before shouting, "Teleport! Acrion!" and disappeared in a blue flash of light.

When I emerged on the 29th floor I could see the regular clearers, but saw no sign of a match or showdown area. I turned around just in time to see Kirito and Asuna appear in a ball of blue light as well. When the light died down, I asked them, "Well, here we are, the 29th floor. Now where are those people?"

Kirito frowned. "Did you try calling out to them yet?"

I rolled my eyes. "No, I didn't think it would actually work. I mean, think about it! There's tons of people here, all talking and chattering. How're they gonna pick up my voice asking for a challenge?!" My voice picked up volume as I said those words, so by the time I reached the word "challenge," it was nearly a shout.

As if on cue, the chattering around me died down, and a group of 5 players jumped down from the buildings surrounding us.

Instantly, the three of us drew our swords out of pure instinct. When we realized that they weren't here to hassle us, we put our swords away. I inspected the group that appeared in front of us. There were 5 people total, and they all had big fancy cloaks that hid their faces and weapons, so I couldn't make out anything else.

However, a split second later, they all threw off their cloaks, revealing their true appearances. To say that I was shocked about their appearances would be an understatement.

Their clothes all matched the colors red and black. There were three guys and two girls among them, and three had weapons that were very obviously A-rank weapons.

One of the girls had a longsword strapped to her waist that looked like an A-ranked weapon, and the other had a rapier that seemed to be of slightly lower quality—a B-rank weapon. The other three, the boys, had what looked to be a spear strapped to their backs, and a longsword hanging in their scabbards on their waists.

All 5 of them had different styles of clothing that sported matching colors, red and black. The girls had on some black colored light metal chest and body armour, covering their tops, arms, and legs, along with a pair of boots and handless gloves. The boys had similar armour, but theirs was tailored to fit males. The only one in the group that stood out to me was a boy in different armour and style than the others.

He had a set of what seemed to be A-rank armour, the same quality as mine, and both his spear and sword were A-rank weapons. The 4 that stood slightly behind him all had armour that was pure black, but he had armour that was obsidian black with a clear crimson red outline that signified a better piece of equipment than armour with a solid color.

He had a neutral expression on his face, but I knew that he was secretly sizing me up and analyzing me, just as I was doing to him. He emitted an aura that was more superior than the others, though not by much. It was clear that he was the one Kirito described while fighting with the KoB.

After a few moments of silence, the boy I was eyeing spoke up. "Well, what is it? You want a challenge or not?" He looked around, then looked back at me. "Where are your other guild-mates? It can't be those two," he said pointing behind me, "Because we already faced with them."

I felt Asuna and Kirito stiffen up from being mentioned so casually, but I smirked nonetheless. "Nope, you're right. You did face off with them, but you didn't face me yet." My smirk turned slowly into a grin. "I'm a soloer, and I heard that you're issuing a challenge. Well, I could certainly use some help while out grinding or killing bosses, so I'm gonna make you join up with me."

My speech had its intended effect. The boy stiffened slightly, and the 4 others gasped quietly with surprise. I could read their thoughts by the expressions on their shocked faces. _Not only does he expect to win when no one else has, but alone?! Either this guy has serious skill, or he's a bumbling idiot who's gone over the edge._

I chuckled internally as I waited for their answer. After the 5 conversed with each other, the boy I singled out stepped forward and nodded. "We accept your challenge. We'll do the duel right now, and as promised, if you somehow manage to beat us, you will have our cooperation." Skepticism was clear in his voice, but I shrugged it off. If all went according to plan, he and his companions would be with me, and me alone.

He sent the duel request, and I quickly scanned the contents: 5 v 1, half-health duel. I nodded and pressed the accept button. The crowd surrounding us, including Asuna and Kirito, had back up a lot and created a large, circular ring suitable for a duel between 6 players. I took out my dagger and sword and began analyzing my situation.

My opponents were all very high-leveled, but only one was going to be a slight problem for me. If I took out his supports at the beginning, it would just be a 1 v. 1, and I never lost those. The 4 others all drew their swords, and their apparent leader drew his spear.

When the 60 second countdown ended, the 6 of us rushed at each other and started the duel. By the way they were running I could tell that their primary attack plan was to surround and overpower me at once. To avoid this, I changed my trajectory and headed straight for one of the boys. He was a bit startled that I headed right for him, but attacked me anyways.

Due to the fact that sword skills, although powerful, had a paralysis effect that rendered a player immobile for a few seconds, they weren't commonly used in duels until a player was sure that he had the win in their grasp.

His sword met mine in a clash of sparks, but I slashed at him with my dagger, bringing his HP down about 4%. He leapt back and charged again, but with the same result. He then ran back to regroup with the others.

After they regrouped, they advanced on me together, moving as one unit. I poked at their defenses, but now the boys had their spears drawn and made it impossible for me to advance onto them without getting skewered. I growled; this wasn't going to end well for me unless I had a plan to counter their formation!

Many scenarios ran through my head in an instant, but none of them worked! All of them ended with my defeat, and I just couldn't accept defeat! I thought some more, then settled on one plan—it was risky and had a high chance of me losing, but there was still a chance that I could win, and I would make the most of it.

Suddenly I heard a shout, and when I came out of my thoughts the group of 5 charged at me, swords out and ready. I readied my dagger and sword, and braced myself for their assault. 5 blades dug into my virtual skin, but retracted real quick when I used an AoE skill, sending them all flying onto their backs and knocking their HP down 20% each.

When my temporary paralysis wore off I jumped to the side, narrowly dodging a spear that one of the boys threw at me. I ran towards the spear, took aim, and chucked it at whoever was closest to me.

Due to my _very, very_ low spear ability level, the spear flew through the air and completely missed the one I was aiming at… and hit the boy standing 5 meters away from him. That boy was the one I attacked the first time, and with the combination of my initial assault, the AoE sword skill and the spear plunged in his body, his HP fell down into the yellow and knocked him out of the duel.

I could see the shock on his face and then resignation. My attention was drawn back to battle, however, when another spear stuck itself in my body, lowering my HP to 75%. I looked at the player whom had thrown it, and recognized the leader approaching me at an uncomfortable pace—definitely an agility-based character.

I kicked away the other boy who was too close for comfort, and swiftly took down one of the girls by throwing a knife previously dipped in paralysis poison at her, and engaged their leader in single combat.

At the moment our swords first clashed together, I knew that whoever I was facing was _not_ a pushover. His technique was seemingly flawless, and left openings that I almost never managed to exploit. He was fast, he was strong, and he was definitely worthy of the gear he bore. I kept up with him until the moment the other girl and boy decided to intervene.

I had just parried a blow from the leader when my sense of danger told me to jump up. When I did I saw a metallic flash below me—the other boy still in commission had tried to slash at me while I was still preoccupied with their leader. It was a low move to make, but if I were in his position I would've done the same. In this death trap, integrity was the least thing one needed to be worried about if their lives were constantly on the line.

Anyways, after the boy tried to attack me from behind, I landed in front of him and finished him off by stabbing his shoulder and slashing down, effectively cutting off his sword arm. The boy leapt back in surprise and discomfort when his arm came off, and looked to see that his HP bar was also in the yellow now; he was out of the duel as well.

Meanwhile, I simultaneously dodged the attacks from both the uncrippled girl and the leader and kicked the leader in the face before retreating a safe distance to recalculate my plan and strategy.

So far I had taken two out and paralyzed one, leaving two remaining. Judging on how well the leader fought, I'd speculate that he was at a slightly lower level than me, but much higher than I had expected. The other girl, however, wasn't going to be a problem. She was probably only 5 or 6 levels below me, but that level difference made it that much easier to defeat her. I decided in that moment that she'd be the next one to be taken out.

When we ran at each other again, I threw 3 more knives, each one inflicting her with a different status ailment. Burn, poison and paralysis showed up on her HP bar and she collapsed to the ground, trying her hardest to get back up.

With her out of the way, it was once again a 1 v. 1 duel against the leader. Before we fought, he spoke. "You surely are something else, Lucifer. Your reputation precedes you as one of the most, if not most powerful player in the game. Taking out my four party-mates is not an easy task; not even the KoB managed to knock us down to 1 player. You have me and my party-mates' utmost respect, and will follow you till the end of this game. Please allow us to join you in your journey."

He kneeled before me, and I frantically waved my hand for him to get up. "A-ah alright, alright I get it already so stop kneeling!"

The leader smiled before getting up and dusting himself off. "I see that you aren't like those other power-hungry bastards from the powerful guilds and the Army. Commendable. It will be a pleasure traveling with you, Lucifer. My name is Fionn."

I smiled as well, and said, "No need to call me by my pseudoname, Fionn. Call me Krystor." I looked around and saw the crowd looking at us confused turned back to him. "Well… let's get this duel finished up. We can discuss what we'll do afterwards."

Fionn smiled and agreed saying, "Yes, let us finish this match. It has gone on far too long."

We back up slightly, readied our weapons, and charged at each other, slashing and hacking, throwing up a great storm of sparks and cacophonous sound. After about a minute into the duel, I finally found an opening in Fionn's stance and immediately activated a simple sword skill, Snake Bite. Three quick jabs later, the bell rang, signifying me as the winner of the duel.

The crowd surrounding us roared, rushing towards us to congratulate me for the win that no other guild was able to do. I quickly told Fionn to gather the others and meet me at the teleport gate on floor 22 as soon as possible. He nodded and disappeared into the crowd, searching for his party-mates.

I sighed and quickly grabbed Asuna and Kirito and plunged through the thick crowd, aiming for the teleport gate a couple hundred players away.

When we finally reached the teleport pad, we shouted out, "Teleport, Abram!" and disappeared in a flash. The moment we arrived on the 22nd floor, we saw the 5 players standing next to the gate, evidently waiting for us.

Fionn saw us and waved us over. "Hey, Krystor. We're all here now. I discussed things with my party-mates and we all unanimously decided to permanently join you on your travels—that is, if you'll allow us to. We know that you're a soloer, but-"

I cut him off with a laugh. "Don't worry about that trivial detail, Fionn. I can easily transition to working with a party. After all, I did have to team up with this stud back in the beta several times before." I stuck out my thumb and pointed it at Kirito, whom looked at me with eyes that asked, _why?_ I shrugged at him and smiled, turning back to Fionn. "I'll be happy to party with strong players like you, and as long as you don't mind my crazy grinding habits, we'll be fine."

Fionn laughed and said, "Well, don't worry about that; we had a crazy grinding schedule as well." His eyes widened in realization. "Oh! I forgot to introduce you!" He dragged the other four up to me and introduced each of them.

"This here is Clyde. He's a great sword-wielder and decent spearman. He's Lv. 44 currently." He moved to the next one. "This here's Schwertleite. She's a master swordswoman and very perceptive. She also has a high stealth and search skill. She's Lv. 45. This here's D'Argtnan, and he's the best spear-wielder we have. He's decent with a sword, but he truly shines with a spear. He's Lv. 46 as well."

He moved on to the last person, a girl with extraordinary beauty. Don't get me wrong, Schwertleite was a beauty as well, but this one stuck out to me. She had an air of regality and confidence that seemed to lure me in. She noticed me staring at her and smiled. I smiled back and then tore my gaze off of her, as it was probably making her a bit uncomfortable.

"This one is Astarte, my second in command. She's as good as I am with a sword, and faster than I am in combat. I was quite surprised when you took her out so quickly." Astarte looked down at the ground in embarrassment, and mumbled something I didn't quite catch. "Anyways, Astarte here just got to Lv. 49, and I'm level 51. If you don't mind me asking, what level are you?"

I grinned. "Lv. 54."

Fionn and the others aside from Kirito and Asuna gawked at me, and I laughed, albeit nervously. I looked to Asuna and Kirito for help, but they were seemingly engaged in a 'conversation,' so I got no help from them.

I heard an 'umm…' and I turned back to see Astarte looking at me as if she had a question to ask.

"Yes, Astarte?"

"Um… were you the one who cleared the 28th Floor a couple days ago? My party and I were getting pumped for that boss raid because we knew that it would be soon, but when we came back to town and heard that somehow the floor got cleared already! We then thought of trying to find a way to contact that insanely strong player or players, but to no avail; so we resorted to this duel tactic to find them."

I grinned. "And I guess it worked." I pulled Kirito out of his 'conversation' with Asuna, literally, and put my arm around his shoulder. "It was the two of us who defeated the boss. I surely would've died had it not been for him!"

Fionn and the others nodded. "Yes, he was a tough one. I'd wager his level to be at least as high as mine, because he was giving me a really hard time until my other teammates brought him down." He looked at Kirito apologetically. "Sorry about that."

Kirito waved his hand dismissively. "Nah, don't worry about that. You just did what you did; you fought and won fairly. No hard feelings."

The group of 5 smiled collectively and dragged the three of us towards town, shouting that we were gonna celebrate my victory and have fun for tonight. I tried to decline but they insisted, dragging me along the way by the collar.

I sighed internally as I was being dragged backwards by a smirking Astarte. _What have I gotten myself into now?!_


End file.
